Wasted potential

Hector Camacho. I know he had drug problems but I didn’t know it was THAT bad until I saw the documentary.

I don’t know if Sammy Serrano was a user, but he did time for moving drugs.

Even Carlos Ortiz, arguably the greatest PR boxer ever, was an alcoholic.

 

I am not sure Camacho "wasted" has potential, so much as he just becaem frightened of being it after the Rosario fight.

 

It was so sleazy, a lot of Don King fighters were “managed” by his son, Carl King.

Managers are supposed to be fighting for their clients’ best interests. They will fight with the promoter to negotiate to get as much money possible for their client. Somehow I doubt Carl King was arguing with Don King for extra money for his fighters.

There was a whole list of fights Tim Witherspoon was woefully underpaid. He was supposed to get over a million for Frank Bruno and got around $100,000

 

1980s heavyweights- Witherspoon, Tucker, Pinklon Thomas, the list goes on. Lot of quality heavyweights who underachieved

Jose Luis Lopez - really talented Welterweight in the 90s

Bernard Mayes

 

I think he always had more of that survival instinct in him, and Rosario really brought it out. But he was a major drug abuser. He almost jumped out of a window during a drug binge before the Montes fight, very early in his career. He was constantly using and was almost caught with a kilo of coke at the Mexican border.

He went from being one of the top P4P guys in the world in the mid 80s to barely getting by Ray Mancini at the end of the decade. Mancini hadn’t fought in 4 years

 

Lopez, yeah. I think he just liked to surf and smoke weed. His fight with James Page was probably the best WW fight of the 90s

 

surprised it took this long bc he just passed, but Leon Spinks

 

Wilfredo Gomez & Sixto Escobar also struggled really badly with coke and booze, respectively. Don't know how much it affected their careers though.

There's something about boxing and cocaethylene.. It got Whitaker, JCC, and Oscar too (though after their primes).. cocaine is a hell of a drug man. I'm glad I can't touch the **** without experiencing instant tachycardia.

 

Gary Russel Jr

 

Cocaine is just a popular drug in general, although I think it’s overrated. For boxers and other athletes/entertainers, it may be the rush. Sugar Ray Leonard said the feeling and rush he got from boxing in a big match and winning was like none other, especially when they would say his name as the winner and they raise his arm and the crowd applauds. When he retired in 1982, he missed it, and tried to replicate that feeling with alcohol and coke, but it wasn’t the same.

I’m sure other boxers and entertainers feel the same way. Ricky Bell from New Edition/BBD said the same thing, getting hooked on the feeling of performing in front of excited audiences. When it’s not there, you try to find a replacement, and it’s often drugs.

 

Edwin Valero, a terrifying machine of a man, psycho though, DEADLY!

 

Bowe and Tyson. They had great careers but could have been even better. They were past their best in their mid 20s.

 

True, but he struggles with anyone who isn't "the man", doesn't take on the other world class guys, isn't consistently in the ring...

 

Haha. Why do you ****ers always seem to deliver back handed one liners when I’m drinking something......

 

Most the boxers listed are Champions, which means they are overachievers who made it into the top 0.1% of boxing

Wasted potential boxers never make it, they end up part-time journeymen who are forced to take unfavorable fights on very short notices, then take low reward-high risk roles in crimes.

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