Why did Prince Naseem Hamed retire?

Good article on Hamed in todays Times:




Amid the kind of talk that invariably comes before a big contest, Marco Antonio Barrera has fired off one line that counts as considerably more than just an eve-of-battle cliché: “Don't forget what I did to Prince Naseem Hamed.” At the time, Amir Khan, whom Barrera faces in Manchester tomorrow, was 14, but he will not need a history lesson on how his next opponent put out the lights on one of the most dazzling careers in the sport.

Hamed disappeared from the pinnacle of the sport even faster than he got there. You see him at the occasional promotion, a magnet for a TV interviewer, still flirting with the camera and the idea that a comeback is yet in him. But it is the jowls that give it away. When he rang his former trainer, Emanuel Steward, a year ago and said: “Manny, I'm coming back, I'm cleaning up again.” Steward's response was: “What are you cleaning up, Naz, the light-heavyweight division?”

For years, it was possible to take seriously the idea that there was more left in the career of the “Prince”. After all, they say that the mark of a boxer is how he responds when he is down.

But as the years passed and Hamed's vanishing act became more pronounced, it was clear that when he boxed at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas on April 7, 2001, Barrera took from him more than just his unbeaten record. “The invincibility had gone, and it was Barrera who took it,” Barry Hearn, the boxer's promoter at the time, said.

And Hamed, according to Hearn, was unable to come to terms with what he had lost. “Naz wasn't the easiest to communicate with,” he said. “But I don't think he ever really wanted to address what had happened. Yes, the invincibility had gone, though he would never admit that.”

The anatomy of the end of Hamed's career is fascinating, if partly because it was so unexpected. Much of it is preserved in a documentary that he commissioned, a film of the build-up to the contest against Barrera that shows Hamed and his brothers in their pre-bout camp in a luxury villa in Palm Springs, California, sunning themselves and laughing at the concept of Barrera working in the hardness of nearby Big Bear Mountain.

It is a picture of arrogance and complacency. “Whatever the Prince wants, the Prince will get,” is one line from his elder brother, Riath. And that included sending a man to Mexico for a pair of green goatskin boxing gloves and flying in his personal barber on the eve of the bout. The same picture is painted by Steward, who would fly in and out and leave the full-time training to the late Oscar Suarez. Steward found a lack of application and sparring that “was almost non- existent”. “I told Naz, ‘I do not like the preparation,'” he said. “I was totally paranoid.”

Maurice Core, Hamed's friend and former cornerman, also recalls a lack of focus. “Family played more of a factor than it should have done,” he said. “I believe you go into camp to get away from family, not to make a fuss over them.”

But this is also a picture of self-belief at its extreme. In the bout, too, Hamed neglected his incomparable boxing skills, always believing that his one-shot power would suffice. It took Barrera - professional, tough, unremitting - little time to expose his delusion. Hamed lasted the distance but his aura was blown after the opening rounds.

And we can only guess at the depth of the psychological wounds. Hamed would box once more, a year later against Manuel Calvo, of Spain, but his charisma, style and speed had been replaced by a play-safe conservatism. He was booed out of the ring and would be seen no more.

“After Calvo, the line went very quiet,” Hearn said. “He just shrugged his shoulders and said, 'I'll let you know.' I think we both understood that letting me know would never happen. But he's never actually retired.”

Yet, as Johnny Nelson, one of Hamed's many estranged friends from his Sheffield heyday, said: “We know when the bubble was burst. Naz really believed he was a gift from Allah, so when that idea was taken away from him, it shattered him.”

It was some years later that Hamed started to build bridges with Frank Warren, the promoter who had guided him through much of his career. Inevitably Hamed started talking of comebacks. “Even a couple of years ago, he talked about it,” Warren said. “I told him, ‘You must be off your head.' At one stage he wanted to fight Amir.”

Yet Core sees all this as the old ego talking. “It's hard to realise that you're not boxing again,” he said. “That's why he keeps going on TV and saying, ‘I'm coming back.' But he's not coming back.”

Indeed, he is not. He is 35 and, in Warren's view, “could never get back what he had”. So he remains, in Steward's mind, “one of the greatest talents our sport has ever had”. For Warren, “he never fulfilled his total talent”. He could look at himself for the reasons why, and he could look at Barrera, too.

 

Nah not really IMO.
He was pretty damn good but could and should have been much much better. He was an arrogant arsehole who thought he was bigger than the sport. Totally underestimated a ring legend and paid the ultimate price.

The way he dissappeared up his own backside was a great shame to many boxing fans.

He could have been a legend himself but instead he will forever be known as a clown who threw away a god given talent. A real pity.

 

This has to be the easiest question ever asked here.




He got rich and he got lazy and he enjoyed non professional boxing type activities and therefore he effectively retired after his greatest pay day.

A prime Naseem Hamed, fully trained would have taken Barrera out, no doubt.

 

This is why I reckon..................................

Hamed start boxing at 7 years old

He trained / fought non stop until 27 years old

During that time he accumaltled wealth.

Got deluded believing his own ego.

Got lazy.

And got stale with boxing - having done it for so long non stop.

He got married and had kids - and they became the most important thing

He was comfortable and statisifed with what he achieved and lost desire

But another key point is this

He is not a "raw" enough person to have a long career

Fighters like Toney, Holyfield, are real true fighting men who will fight all their lifes

They are raw from the Ghetto, fighters at heart

Naz was more a althelte - more civilsed to normal life - not hardcore enough to ply his trade for the sake of just loving fighting

This is not a insult on Naz- i was a big Prince Naz Fan

But he never was cut from the same warrior kind of cloth as a Barrera, Morales, Chavez,

He was as good as them - but more a domesticated human being - a more "normal" man

Them fighters like Holyfield it dont matter if they married with 10 kids - they will still fighter because thats just what they are

Naz is different - if his life had gone different - he could have just has easily been a athlete doing something else - like Gymnastics

Toney, Roy Jones, Tyson, Holyfield, Bowe, Trindad, etc, etc - they just more deep down raw natural fighters

 

jeez,flint,i bet you were good at essays at school:hey

 

I was actually - in Primary School

 

I think this explains alot about Hamed's retirement:

Johnny Nelson, one of Hamed's many estranged friends from his Sheffield heyday, said: “We know when the bubble was burst. Naz really believed he was a gift from Allah, so when that idea was taken away from him, it shattered him.”

 

Hit the nail on the head there. Long and short of it is he just lost interest. People talk about his skills declining, but when I watch him against Kelley and Sanchez I see a man sticking his chin out, wanting to be hit, taking some big shots and still KTFO of his opponent.

 

Every featherweight in the world should be thanking NaZ for single handedly increasing there pay checks five fold after the interest he garnered for the wee men.

 

He blatantly knew he did not have it in him, so instead of going through the moments and pursuing in more big fights, he knew a more bigger humiliation would happen.

can i blame him, no..but disappointed as he was something special.

 

Got to agree with this post, exactly what I was going to say.

He got lazy, lost his hunger for training, and his poor performance against Barrera was due to a terrible training camp, in which he was too lazy to run and train with any intensity.

You cannot fight an elite fighter, at the top of his game, without being in your best possible mental and physical shape. He realised after Barerra he was never going to get in that shape again, as the money had changed him and he was not interested in being the best he could be in the ring anymore.

A prime and hungry Hamed rips Barrera a new arse hole IMO.

 

Its obviously not the main reason but I Dont think the crowd in the calvo fight helped at all either. His his confidence was not right and it was his comeback fight against a guy whod never been ko'd which he dominated but he got booed pretty badly.

Just took away further from his already lacking motivation and confidence.

 

What a cracking thread one of the best I have seen since I registered.

I was a Naz fan and went to see many of his fights,like many others I felt totally let down and cheated after the performance he put up against Barrera and it took a while to get over it.

However last year or the year before there was a fantastic article on the BBC website about Naz and it was a truly great read and a massive insight into his mind and his life during the last year of his career.

Like many others I still think of his wasted talent but there is no doubt a fit focused Naz would have beaten Barrera and possibly many of the great featherweights in history.

 

Naz is my favourite brit fighter ever, one of the most naturally gifted fighters in boxing history and among the most exciting.
I think he retired for a number of reasons, among these are the realisation that he didnt have the dedication to the sport that the other guys in his division had. To beat Morales and Barerra at that time 2000/2001, he had to be at the top of his game to make up for the technical deficiencies he had, he had to be training properly and fully focused, he didnt do either.
The split with Ingle was also critical, he was never the same under Suarez and Steward, they tried to change his style and with a boxer like Naz that never works.
As much as i like Naz, i dont think he was ever capable of beating guys of the calibre of Morales, Barerra and Marquez because he would have taken too many shots, he was knocked down by an old Kelley, knocked down by Augie Sanchez, struggled with guys like Cesar Soto and Paul Ingle, so to suggest he could beat the big three mexicans is a leap of faith.
Having said that, what an entertainer, what a fighter .. You always got your PPV moneys worth from Naz ..