Why did Dokes not have a big fight for 6 years after he lost his title?

How much talent did that boy waste?

 

Cocaine seems to be te #1 answer. If I remember right, Dokes did a long stint in rehab in Austrailia after losing the title and this was unsuccessful and he went back to partying and couldn't keep his head straight enough to resume his career.

 

I think it was the nose candy.

 

Dokes became Cokes and went from fighting professionally in the ring to fighting professionally in rehab.

 

The simple answer is cocaine.

The more complex answer is all the things that come with being a drug addict and the consequences of bad decisions.

When you stop being reliable, stop training the way you’re supposed to train, stop putting into the sport what it takes to be successful at it … you lose the people who make it possible for you to succeed.

Why would a promoter invest at minimum tens of thousands of dollars per fight (paying Dokes + a decent opponent who expects to get paid to fight a former world champ) in a guy who may not show up … or may not show up in shape to win the fights you lined up for him to try to get him in contention again?

Why would a manager spend his time and energy trying to line up fights and convince promoters to use an unreliable guy? Almost every manager has more than one fighter, and he’d be doing a disservice to the ones who are dedicated (whether as talented or not) and show up at the gym every day and work hard and stay focused … to spend time instead on the guy who’s off partying or hanging out in drug dens. When a manager asks a promoter to get a guy on a card, he’s putting his own reputation on the line — what if he can’t find Dokes or Dokes no-shows or you have to call the fight off because you find out he’s not been training or in shape? That hurts those other fighters because the manager now has a trust issue — ‘he told me Dokes was ready to get serious again and the guy pulled out, now he wants me to get this guy on my card?’

Same thing for a trainer. Fighters A, B and C show up every day, do their roadwork, do what’s asked, push themselves. Dokes at this stage probably wasn’t showing up every day, putting in the work. So he walks in the gym one day and you tell those other guys to do their routines while you spend time with him … and maybe he shows up again next week or next month … or not at all?

It’s pretty simple, really.

Dokes found a manager after he got clean who really put a lot into him and believed in him and revived his career. But he had to get clean first. When he did, he might have lost some stuff physically but he became reliable enough for someone to invest their time, energy and money in him.

 

I thought it was well understood he was coked out.