 The Worldwide Boxing Magazine Site |
Got your free t-shirt yet? |
| articles from the magazine ... |
|
May 1998
Each month we bring you a selection of articles from the current and past issues of BOXING MONTHLY. To buy the magazine, see our subscription or back issues pages, or use our world distribution map to find a news-stand copy. Why not use our Interactive Forum to express your own boxing comments and opinions!
|
 |
CALL HIM MR. BRIGGS
Eventually WBC heavyweight champ Lennox Lewis overcame the much-hyped Shannon Briggs, but not before the question-mark challenger proved himself to be all fighter. GLYN LEACH reports from Atlantic City |
|
His former trainer, Teddy Atlas, had warned: "Shannon Briggs
has a great ability to be a con man." And so it proved, though
perhaps not in the spirit intended by the hard-line New York
coach who, legend has it, once put a gun in Mike Tyson's mouth
in order to make a point.
Brooklynite Briggs, now trained by Cuban Carlos Albuerne and beaten
in five rounds by London-born Lennox Lewis, the World Boxing
Council heavyweight champion, on 28 March in Atlantic City,
certainly had the international press corps fooled. Entering
this fight he was considered to be of questionable heart, chin
and resolve, but no more. He entered the ring looking for
respect and he earned it in as thrilling a heavyweight title
fight as has been staged this decade.
This was war, pure and unadulterated. Hearts were worn on sleeves,
heavy punches crashed home in every round and the Convention
Center crowd of 9,173 stood on its feet and roared their approval
of a fight that was widely perceived to be a mismatch. So much
for "expert" opinion.
The cynical decided that an uncommonly low-key fight week in
Atlantic City had presented evidence enough to suggest that
Briggs did not fancy the job in hand. Indeed, the New
Jersey-based contender appeared to have been setting the scene
for his own imminent downfall. A case of the gun being introduced
in Act One.
Briggs, 26, had busily planted excuses for why he might not
perform on the biggest night of his 31-fight career (30 wins,
24 by KO), seemingly laying the ground for life after Lewis's
anticipated onslaught.
Fight week reports that a Briggs hand injury threatened the
fight's cancellation proved to be erroneous, but emanated from
somewhere other than the overactive imagination of a
trigger-happy journalist, it is to be hoped. Smoke without
fire is unusual.
More worryingly, the bottle-blond dreadlocked challenger, who
blamed the only previous loss of his career - by third-round
TKO against Darroll Wilson two years earlier - on an asthma
attack, had demonstrated a curious preoccupation with dust
mites; absolutely everywhere they are, Briggs warned, hell
bent on precipitating breathing difficulties for him at any
given moment. Briggs attempted to guard against such cruel
misfortune by bringing his own medicated shampoo and
reportedly travelling by pristine limousine whenever required
to leave his hotel.
Briggs's apparent paranoia regarding microscopic organisms was
wasted, we thought. His primary concern should have been the
gargantuan Lewis, 32, who at 6ft 5ins and 17st 5lbs had
intimidated the fight out of his last three opponents and
whose recent reign of terror was beginning to recall the days
when a generation of heavyweight psyches imploded at the very
mention of Mike Tyson.
Oliver McCall, infamously, was reduced to tears by Lewis 13
months previously, enabling Lewis to reverse his only loss
and regain the WBC title; the 6ft 7ins Henry Akinwande, like
the recovering crack addict McCall, was disqualified in round
five, but for clinging to Lewis like an elongated limpet -
apparently his only recourse; and the anxiety attack suffered
by Andrzej Golota after Lewis blasted him in 95 seconds last
October actually began before the Polish bad boy entered the
ring, it has since been intimated by former associates.
But while it was Lewis, making the third defence of his second
tenure as WBC champ, who got the win (his 33rd in 24 fights,
27 by KO) he needed to keep his dreams of a unification fight
with Evander Holyfield, the World Boxing Association and
International Boxing Federation champion, alive it was Briggs,
the bleached version of this brace of dreadlocked behemoths,
who arguably gained most from the showdown.
His manager, New Jersey stockbroker Marc Roberts, had raised
$5 million for his sports marketing agency, WorldWide Sports
and Entertainments, on the strength of Briggs's potential as
contender, but those shares plummeted following Briggs's
controversial, some claimed corrupt - the FBI have yet to
decide - points win over George Foreman at the end of last
year. But the stock of the fighter who wears the NASDAQ logo
on his shorts seems certain to rise after this performance.
After rocking Lewis and almost getting him out of there in a
shocking first round, Briggs, despite suffering several
knockdowns, always threatened until finally, after one minute
and 45 seconds of the fifth and having taken 13 unanswered
punches, the exhausted challenger collapsed to the floor,
having missed with a desperation left hook, and referee
Frank Cappuccino waved it over.
"I would have preferred to have been stopped for getting hit
rather than for missing with a punch," said Briggs. "I should
have been a little more composed in round one when I hurt him,
but I was a little excited and a little surprised, and he was
able to hang on and do his thing."
And a curious thing it was. Lewis, normally so cool and
collected, lost his composure and so very nearly his title and
the opportunity to prove himself, beyond doubt, to be the
world's leading heavyweight. His tactics went out of the window
following pre-fight taunts from the challenger and he was only
just able to get back on track.
"He was standing there saying: 'You ain't nuthin',' Lewis
revealed afterwards. "I wanted to take his head off."
After 10 years as a professional and a life in boxing, it is
hardly likely that being told you are "nuthin'" would cause
one too many problems, I'd venture to say. Nonetheless, this
is what we are required to believe is the reason for Lewis
very nearly losing his title by first-round KO.
More likely, Lewis took Briggs lightly - and he had every reason
to, given the evidence. Still, the champion should have learned
from the mistakes of the first McCall fight - no one is more
dangerous than the man inside who whispers: "This is gonna be
an easy night."
Lewis's veteran trainer, the revered Emanuel Steward, added: "He
was all worked up emotionally in the opener. I had to get him to
calm down when he came back to the corner.
"But every fighter needs a fight like this. Lennox has definitely
proved he's not the usual heavyweight. He dug in, gutted it out
and ground out the win.
"Tonight he proved that he's not just a good heavyweight, he's an
exciting one."
But almost at too high a cost. Briggs caught him with a hook midway
through the first round and Lewis went staggering backwards, only
the ropes saving him from going down. Disorientated, Lewis then
took a right to the back of the head, which wrecked his equilibrium.
He appeared to touch down with one glove, which would have
constituted a knockdown, had the referee chosen to issue a count.
Things looked bad for Lewis. Memories of the one loss of his career,
by second-round stoppage to McCall in September 1994, came flooding
back as the champion looked stunned and unable to recover. Briggs
grinned malevolently, but Lewis, somehow, survived to the bell.
Coming out for round two Lewis's legs looked unsteady still, but
he managed to shake off the effects of a hard left hook and in the
third, finally, the champion began to put it together, landing big
shots to Briggs's body, punches that made the challenger breath hard.
The first punch of the fourth round changed the course of the
fight. A left hook crashed into Briggs's jaw and his legs turned
to jelly in a delayed reaction. Lewis, tired and breathing heavily
himself, chased after him, but Briggs bravely did whatever he could
to stay upright until Lewis's pet punch, the big right-hand,
dropped the American by the ropes. But after a short count, Briggs
was up and looking for revenge, which he thought was his when he
nailed Lewis with his own favourite shot, the left hook, and the
champion stood stock still and dropped his hands. Unfortunately for
Briggs, Lewis was playing possum, much as he did in the ninth round
of his first title defence against Tony Tucker, and the challenger
walked onto a left-right combination that dropped him for the
second time in the round. But once again Briggs got up and fought
back, and by the end of the round his grin, if a little sickly by
now, had returned.
Briggs stormed out for round five, looking to regain the
initiative, but Lewis cracked him with a right, followed up with
a barrage, and then landed a huge right that seemed to nail Briggs
to the canvas, where he lay motionless. Surely he'd stay down this
time. But no, quite incredibly, Briggs returned to life and to his
feet, walked to a neutral corner and grinned at the crowd that by
now had reached fever pitch. Briggs was all but done, however, but
it was fitting that the fight should end with him trying to claw
his way back into it, putting so much force into a final left hook
that, when it missed, the momentum saw him collapse to the canvas,
wasted. Of course he got up again, but the decision to end it
there was correct.
Aside from a $4 million purse, taking Lewis's career earnings
above the $50 million mark, the champion gained little from
beating Briggs, who earned a career-highest $1.5 million. There's
the supposed linear title dating back to the last century and
John L. Sullivan, won by Briggs against a 48-year-old George
Foreman four months earlier, but little else.
"A victory over Briggs figures to raise Lewis' charisma quotient
only about as high as Mike Tyson's tactics," wrote Jay Greenberg
in the New York Post.
But Lewis's quest for a title unification showdown with Holyfield
lives on. First the champions must deal with mandatory defence
requirements; Holyfield against the Anglo-Nigerian, U.S.-based
Henry Akinwande in New York on 6 June, while Lewis will meet the
undefeated Croatian Mohawk, Zeljko Mavrovic, in September,
possibly in Britain, where Lewis hasn't fought for four years,
said his manager, Frank Maloney.
"The evidence speaks for itself," claimed Lewis. "Holyfield would
rather fight Henry Akinwande than me." Which is like saying that
Lewis would rather fight Mavrovic than Holyfield, but there you go.
Lewis continued unabashed: "I showed Mavrovic how tough I am - I
hope he's tough." Hopefully not as tough as Briggs proved to be.
"He's a great champion," said Briggs at the post-fight press
conference. "You guys have got to start giving him the respect he
deserves." That Shannon; he always says the right thing.
Briggs is personable, articulate and physically imposing at 6ft
3ins and 16st 4lbs, but was the subject of distrust. Undoubtedly
he is the most-hyped heavyweight prospect of the last 10 years
and leaves Lewis in the blocks when it comes to handling the
media. But the suspicion was that Briggs makes a better celebrity
- and his resume includes TV appearances and a spot of rapping on
The Fujees platinum-selling album - than a fighter. Lewis was a
12-1 on favourite with the Las Vegas bookmakers.
The challenger claims that he is on a mission to improve the
image of boxers and already has started a public relations
company, Alter Ego, to keep him busy when his boxing career
ends, the aim being to attract to the sport the major sponsorship
enjoyed by America's football, baseball and basketball players.
What Briggs achieved against Lewis was a major improvement of
his own image as a fighter. Many, myself included, felt that he
was just the latest saleable big guy who had been taught to box
a bit but would never make the grade. Briggs might never become
a world champion, although in this day and age he could sue his
handlers for mismanagement if he does not. But undoubtedly he is
all fighter. I had suggested otherwise in my report of the Foreman
fight and for that I apologise without reservation. He fought for
respect and he has earned mine. |
|
Also available to read from issue:
|
|
On sale on the last Thursday of every month Ensure you never miss a copy . . . buy your subscription or back issues here. |