By GorDoom

DOWN HERE IN THE REAL BIG EMPTY


   The 90's will be remembered for three hyper-modern, Shakespearian tragedies: Bill Clinton, OJ Simpson & Mike Tyson. As we careen down the home stretch of the 20th Century, these three figures have redefined the meaning of self destruction.

    Since it be boxing we talk in this publication, it is the enigma that is Leg-Iron Mike Tyson, that we will discuss:  A  man who is many different things to different people, but one thing is certain: He has been the single biggest sports attraction in history... & to this day he unfortunately remains so.

   Leg-Iron Mike has been released from his latest incarceration & the media flacks are gonna try to convince us that Leg-Iron is not only the heavyweight champion of the United States Penal System - but that he also has a divine right to reclaim the heavyweight championship of boxing...

   Yeah, well... Believe that & you'll also believe Dan Quayle is a Rhodes Scholar... Ol' Leg-Iron is only headed for the last show down at the Planned Obsolecense corral.

   So is Evander Holyfield. When he fights Lennox Lewis again, the results won't be much different & the self righteous b.s. will flow like the River Jordan from the "Commander's" bloody, swollen, lips, once again...

   After the Lewis fight, Evander should have stepped up to the plate & admitted he had a bad night & got lucky with the judges. Instead, we got more pious, self serving crap, about how The Lord  really meant he'd knock out
Lewis in the third round of their rematch.

   Yeah. Right ...

   Has anybody noticed that nobody ever loses anymore? It seems like no team, athlete or boxer ever just simply loses a match ... There's always some excuse: hidden injuries, bad refs, the coach/manager/trainer doesn't understand me, room service sent up the wrong damn breakfast...

   That's why it was so amazing too hear Ivan Robinson say after his loss to Angel Manfredy, "I lost to the better man tonight. I'll be back".

   The simple dignity of that statement spoke volumes about what kind of man Ivan Robinson is... He may not be the greatest fighter in the world, but the Ol' Spit Bucket has more respect for him than Leg-Iron & Holy Moley combined ...
                                      
                                        

Prince Naseem Hamed

Boxing's Newest Superstar Is Also Its Most Misunderstood

By George Azar

The international press corps is massed three deep outside the entrance of Ballys Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City. British photographers jostle German television crews, who push Argentinean cameramen against Arab TV personalities and American newspaper writers. At 1 p.m. a white limousine pulls up and I press against the outer fringes of the crowd, craning to see the most unlikely hero in modern sport.

Under the harsh glare of klieg lights a car door swings open and from it emerges a diminutive British-born Yemeni, wearing a grin as wide as the Persian Gulf. Prince Naseem Hamed, the hip-hop generation's undefeated featherweight champion of the world, professional sport's first Arab superstar and boxing's most charismatic personality since Muhammad Ali has landed on the Boardwalk in Atlantic City.

Over the last two years, Hamed (or Naz) has electrified the fight game. He is Ali, Jack Dempsey and the Spice Girls rolled into one. A preening, bombastic terminator, Naz is at once the most wildly unorthodox fighter since the introduction of the Queensbury rules, the greatest showman in decades, and the most feared puncher in the history of the featherweight division.

In the ring he violates every boxing convention, or as HBO analyst Jim Lampley put it, ``Naseem not only breaks all the rules of textbook boxing, he looks as though he hasn't even looked at the table of contents.'' Yet his one-punch KO of challenger Paul Ingle last month brought his professional record to 32-0, with 29 knock-outs, which translates to a phenomenal 90% KO rate. The electric rave party atmosphere of his matches has drawn legions of new fans to the sport. And though he is far and away the most highly paid featherweight in boxing history, he is, with the exception of Mike Tyson, the most criticized prizefighter in the world as well.

The press envelops Hamed, who grinning, hoists his World Boxing Organization championship belt onto his shoulder and saunters into the casino as though he were on a Sunday stroll in his home town of Sheffield, England. Behind, in front and to all sides, news crews follow him onto the casino floor, where the brogue of Naseem's Irish trainer Brendan Ingle barks through a megaphone,

``The star of tomorrow is here today at Ballys! The one and only Arabian knight. . . . Don't blink or you'll miss it!''

Hundreds of elderly heads seem to jerk up from their slot machines at the same time. Remarkably, for a moment even gambling seems to come to a halt.

As Naz surveys the casino floor he declares to the rows of television cameras, ``I'm holding up these three fingers cause, he's going in three rounds. I'm not going to be out there messin' Around. I'm in there to dominate the fight.''

In the middle of his filibuster Hamed catches sight of me and holds up his palm to slap a high five. I lean over a TV crew and swat his hand. At the instant of contact Naz snatches my palm, pulls me up and over the top of several journalists and whispers in my ear.

And what did the man savaged by the Anglo-American press as boxing's number one narcissist want to say out of earshot of the news media?

`I'm glad you're here. How's your baby?''

***

Every ethnic group needs heroes. When I was growing up in South Philadelphia's century-old Arab community, my father bragged, ``Did you know that Danny Thomas is Lebanese?'' Later it was, ``Do you know that Dr. DeBakey [the pioneering heart surgeon] is Lebanese?'' After that it was, ``Did you know that Ralph Nader is Lebanese?''

Now, my old neighborhood, centered on 10th Street between Washington Avenue and Wharton Street, is the mythic home of Rocky Balboa, and with no disrespect to Danny Thomas, Ralph Nader or Michael DeBakey, they were never the sort of guys you could hang your emotional hat on. For me and a million other Arab American boys who've grown sick of watching Indiana Jones, Steven Seagal and Chuck Norris pummel generations of Hollywood Arab caricatures, Prince Naseem Hamed is someone we have been waiting for all our lives.

I first heard of him in 1995, in an obscure reference on an internet bulletin board. I had no idea what the fuss was, but clearly an international debate was raging between Naz's British partisans, who proclaimed him as one of history's greatest boxers, and what seemed like legions of American skeptics who forecasted that the argument would end the day Hamed ran up against a serious American fighter.

Hamed's debut on American television took place on June 8, 1996, against undefeated American challenger Daniel Alicea, a tough young Puerto Rican from New York City.

I made sure to watch.

Naseem entered through clouds of white smoke, born aloft on a throne carried by four huge men, his fans cheering like spectators at a rock concert. With a look of smug bemusement, he dismounted, grasped the top rope of the boxing ring, shook his buttocks at the crowd, and somersaulted over the rope into the ring. (One of my friends told me he was so disgusted by the circus act that he felt like ``reaching through the TV and punching the little s.o.b. myself.'')

By the middle of round one I was convinced that, despite his uncanny speed, reflexes and flexibility, not only was Hamed no legend, he was without a doubt the worst professional fighter I'd ever seen. Naseem did everything wrong. He held his hands at his waist, threw punches after getting a running start, turned his back on his opponent, leaped off his feet, and played to the crowd. Alicea, was unamused. He stalked the little Prince and fired textbook-perfect punches with bad intentions. Near the end of the first round, he caught Naseem with a clean shot and deposited him on the seat of his pants. Naz was down for the first time in his career. As the bell ended the round, I thought, ``Ah well, too bad.''

When the bell sounded for Round 2, Hamed roared out and beat Alicea from pillar to post, before knocking him unconscious with a single thunderous shot.

I had to meet this guy.

***

I arrive in downtown London at midnight and go to an ATM to obtain British pounds. During my transaction a West Indian beggar approaches for a handout. ``OK, but first, tell me if you've heard of someone named Naseem Hamed.'' Looking at his feet he says, ``Yea, course I've heard of him.'' ``And what do you think? Is he a bum?'' A change comes over the man. Straightening himself, he says, with an earnest smile, ``No, mon! He's the business. The Prince is the business!''

According to legend, Naseem was discovered at age 6, fighting off three large English boys in a Sheffield schoolyard. Watching from the second tier of a double decker bus, Irish boxing trainer Brendan Ingle was amazed to see the older boys couldn't lay a hand on the tiny Yemeni.

Several weeks later Ingle happened to walk into a corner grocery shop and recognized the boy emerging from behind the counter. It was young Naseem, who, with Ingle's tutelage, would redefine British boxing.

Naseem, whose name means gentle breeze in Arabic, was born in 1974 in Wincobank, a tough section of Sheffield, to Yemeni corner grocers Sal and Caria Hamed. The Hameds were the first Arab family to settle in the area, which was a hotbed for Britain's racist National Front Party. Hamed's older brother and business manager, Riath, recalls the family’s shop windows being smashed. "They'd sing, ‘Ding, dong, the bells are flashing, we’re going Paki-bashing.’"

From London I journey North to Sheffield, where I meet Riath, for dinner. Riath Hamed, 29, is soft spoken, sophisticated and diplomatic, in many ways the antithesis of his boxer brother. The man behind the Hamed financial empire, Riath has helped to make his brother Britain's highest paid sportsman and according to Forbes Magazine, one of the 22 richest athletes in the World. Riath has brokered deals with Audi, Sony, Pepsi and Adidas grossing Naseem more money in product endorsements than Mike Tyson, Evander Holyfield and Oscar DeLaHoya combined.

``So how do you do it?'' I ask. ``Do you have formal business training?''

`Well, not really'' Riath responds quietly. ``My only previous business experience was running the family shop.'' ``Then how do you know what to ask for?'' I wonder. ``Well,'' says Riath, ``it's really not much different than running the store. Essentially, the trick is to have them make the first offer. Then, whatever they propose, I tell them it's not enough.''

The next morning Riath picks me up in his Jaguar XJ8,which at the time is so new I don't recognize what brand of car it is. We drive to Naseem's mansion in a tony section of Sheffield. In front of his home, arranged in perfect semi-circle, are nine automobiles, each costing about the price of a comfortable family home, among them a Lamborgini, a Porsche, an Aston-Martin, a Mercedes, a Jaguar and Ferrari.

Naseem meets me at the door. In person he doesn't seem as small as 5 feet 3 inches would suggest. He walks with a strutting swagger that seems straight off the streets of South Philly . ``So, George,'' he says in his Yorkshire accent, ``I hear you've done well for yourself.'' ``We did a little checking into your background to make sure you were OK,'' Riath confides. ``We were impressed with your work on Noam Chomsky.'' I don't know whether I am more stunned that someone had been investigating my background or that a fighter's management is familiar with the M.I.T. linguist and political philosopher.

Naz asks me to sit in the kitchen, fixes tea, asks how many sugars I'd like, and in keeping with Arab custom, questions me about my life, career and family. Most startling of all, he is genuinely interested.

Unlike many athletes who project an angelic facade to the public, then go home and terrorize their families, the private Naseem Hamed is a courteous young man who, once cameras roll, becomes an pompous, preening egomaniac. An hour into our conversation I have to ask why he acts like such an jerk in public. I relate that my office mate wanted to punch him through the TV screen.

Naz roars with laughter. ``This is what I want them to think. I want people to say either, `The guy is brilliant, I want him to be a legend,' or, on the other side of the coin, `I can't wait till the cocky little bastard, the fucking arrogant little bombastic Arab gets his head knocked completely off his shoulders.' You see, if they think either two of those things, I'm very, very happy. Because if they was to come in the middle of them two things, indifferent, then I've got problems. Indifferent is not good news. I want them to either hate, or to love. But end of the day, they will realize that this kid is a living legend.''

Although his speech, acculturation and manner are thoroughly British, Hamed's deepest identification is as an Arab. In Yemen Naseem is a national hero and six postage stamps have been struck in his honor. Naz’s British braggadocio and American dance moves may draw outward attention, but it is from his Islamic beliefs that Hamed draws the inner strength that has made him world champion. Naseem regards his ability is a gift from Allah, and belief in his own destiny is the essence of his self-assurance.

Fan letters pour into Sheffield, and the Hameds allowed me to pick some at random to read. Remarkably, beyond the obvious requests for autographs and such, nearly all strike the same theme. Whether written by a convict in prison or a 14-year-old girl in her bedroom, all spoke of the powerful sense of self-belief that the Prince inspires in them. To his millions of fans, beyond the music, the dancing and the knockouts, Naseem Hamed is a study in the transformative power of super confidence. After all, if a short, skinny immigrant's son from one of Britain's most marginalized communities can reinvent himself as a boxing ``Prince,'' anything is possible.

The person largely responsible for this metamorphosis is Hamed’s former trainer Brendan Ingle. According to Ingle, his method stresses ``speed, rhythm, balance, mobility, flexibility, and agility. I tell my boxers, if you want to learn to fight, watch Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire dance.'' His fighters incorporate acrobatics, somersaults, and backflips in their training and are masters at sowing confusion in their opponents, cagily switching from an orthodox stance to southpaw and back again. Over the years Ingle has guided several prizefighters to the brink of greatness. Hamed is the first to vault over the top.

Last December, the seventeen year partnership between the "Paddy and the Prince" came to an acrimonious end. The surface reason was a dispute over finances. But more profound was the emotional rift that developed following Hamed’s ascendancy onto the world stage. Naseem had to find himself as both an adult and a world champion, and in doing so, had become estranged from the man who guided him from the schoolyard to madison square garden.

At 6 A.M. the next morning Naz picks me up in his navy blue Ferrari convertible. As I close the door he jams the accelerator. G forces throw me back into my seat as the car hits 50 mph IN 4 seconds. My eyes widen in terror as the corner stoplight flies toward us. Naz presses the brake pedal and the car comes to a smooth, safe stop. I realize, sheepishly, that these cars cost $170,000 not because they go fast, but because they also can stop fast. While we wait for the light to change, a blue truck rolls to a halt next to us. A pretty, strawberry blond English girl sitting in the passenger's seat looks over at us. Her gaze falls on Naseem. Her eyes widen, her jaw goes slack. Naseem is oblivious, grooving to Puff Daddy Combs rapping over his sound system. She reaches over, frantically tugging the driver's sleeve and pointing at Naz. When the driver leans forward, his face goes slack too. The light turns green and Naseem floors it. As we rocket toward the highway entrance, I turn and look behind to see the lorry, still sitting at the light, the driver too stunned to move.

***

Naseem Hamed's American debut was Dec. 19, 1997, in Madison Square Garden, against New York hero Kevin Kelley, the ``Flushing Flash.'' Kelley, a two-time world champion, had lost only once in fifty-one contests. He had never been knocked out. One way or another, questions about Hamed's credibility looked to be settled that night.

Never had so much hype been given over to a featherweight contest. Hamed arrived at JFK with 40 pieces of luggage, a huge entourage and a request to meet Cindy Crawford. A 22 foot high picture of Naseem appeared on the best placed billboard in Times Square and another larger one above the Lincoln tunnel.

Before the fight, Kelley tells the Arab hero, ``By the time I'm through with you, you'll be either driving a cab or running a Seven-Eleven.''

Following Kelly's entrance, the house lights go down. At the end of a long, bulb-lit runway, is a white curtain. As the music to "Men in Black" comes up, a thin silhouette with boxing gloves appears behind the screen, dancing like a hip-hop shadow puppet. The Prince swivels and spins, shadow boxes, freezes, and begins his groove over again. The crowd goes wild. Up in the ring, Kelly paces back and forth, muttering to himself. Naz meanwhile, continues his solo dance party. Three minutes go by. Then four. Then five. By now Kelly, apoplectic, is climbing the ropes, thrusting his fists in the air and shouting for the Prince to come down and fight. Finally, Hamed steps from behind the curtain as confetti explodes in the air, runs a few feet down the runway, then stops. The cheers mix with boos as the Prince slowly revolves his head, drinking in the scene and striking body builder poses. He makes his chest muscles ripple. HBO’s resident wise man Larry Merchant laments, "Folks, this could be the end of Western civilization as we know it." Halfway to the ring Naseem is joined by his entourage who, in dark sun glasses, black knit caps, Arab features and Yemeni flag , look like the World Trade Center bombers. By now the Garden is in pandemonium. Naz climbs the ring steps and surveys the crowd. He shakes his bootie, then somersaults into the ring, coming nose to nose with a livid Kevin Kelly. Fisticuffs nearly break out, before Kelly is restrained by his cut man.

In the early minutes of round one, Naseem's hand speed and reflexes give him an edge as he beats Kelly to the punch and backs him into the corner. Then Hamed commits a cardinal sin, pulling his head straight back to avoid a punch with his chin up in the air. Kelly explodes out of the corner, snapping back the Prince's head, sending him reeling on his heels and down to the canvas. The Garden erupts.

In round two, Naz leaps in with a punch and is caught by a Kelly blow in mid-air. After another exchange Kelly catches him again, sending him down for the second time. "We didn't know what was going to happen,"HBO's Jim Lampley shouts over the crowd's roar," but one of the things that could happen is that the Prince is exposed as a fraud!"

Over the next two and one-half rounds, Hamed and Kelly wage what many observers called the most dramatic punch-out the Garden had seen since Ali-Frazer.

Between rounds, Kelly's corner, buoyed by success, urges him to "Hunt the Peanut!" Coming out for round four, Naz ignores Brendan's pleading,"Just don't get into a war with him!" and throws himself at Kelly, launching a pair of lighting-bolt left hands that short circuit Kelly's nervous system, starching the ‘Flushing Flash' for the only time in his career.

In his post fight interview Naz explains why he defied expectations by battling toe to toe with the larger, more muscular Kelley, ``I just wanted to fight. I showed the heart of a lion...a lion's heart.'' Then, turning to the camera he asks what is really on his mind.

``Larry, tell me...does my hair look good?''

***

Hamed's New York adventure, with an impressive 10.1 Nielsen rating, catapulted him to the cusp of American stardom. Naseem's second U.S. fight _ in Atlantic City against Wayne McCullough would post an astonishing 12.8, making it the most highly watched boxing broadcast of 1998. After only one year on HBO, boxing's little Arab was out drawing both heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis and boxing's ``Golden Boy,'' Oscar DeLaHoya.

Still, Hamed seems unable to contain his critics, especially those in the British press who harbor a near pathological dislike for him. Never was this more apparent than in the aftermath of the McCullough contest.

Wayne the ``Pocket Rocket'' McCullough of Belfast is a former WBC bantamweight world champion and a 1992 Olympic silver medalist. McCullough, 22-1, had never been knocked to the canvas in a professional fight and had lost only once in his career.

Dancing through a mist-filled Halloween graveyard scene, Naseem entered the Atlantic City Convention Center, to Michael Jackson's ``Thriller.'' The house was packed by what seems like half of Ireland. The jeers of thousands of foot stomping McCullough partisans threatens to turn into a riot. A fight errupts behind me when Irish fans trade punches, because each thinks the other is English.

Hamed seemed oblivious to the commotion breaking out all over the arena and proceeded to give McCullough a 12 round beating. Hamed did not fulfill his prediction of a third round KO, though he did control every aspect of the fight.

Naz boxed when he wanted to box, held the center of the ring when he needed to stand his ground, jolted McCullough when he felt like trading leather and made the former bantamweight champ look the fool when he decided to showboat.

By fight's end, a stumbling McCullough, both eyes nearly swelled shut, had to be helped out of the ring. Naseem Hamed had successfully defended his title for the 11th consecutive time and handed McCullough, by far, the most lopsided loss of his career.

The following morning he awoke to find himself once again savaged by the English press. The Daily Mirror led the charge, labeling Hamed's victory a ``devastating flop.''

Part of the press' animosity may be generational. Reared on the charming roguishness of Ali, the middle-aged males that constitute Britain's media elite are genuinely put off by Hamed's surly, hip-hop sensibility. On the other hand, a black friend from Oakland who witnessed a confrontations between Hamed and the media saw the conflict as clearly racial: ``They just can't stand that Naseem doesn't act thankful to them for his success.''

Whatever his ultimate place in the pantheon of great prizefighters, for Arab-Americans, Prince Naseem will always mean something more than just boxing. Hamed is our Joe Louis and Muhammad Ali. When he fights, for us it is more than a sporting event, because each time the Prince steps into that ring he takes all of us with him.

By Thomas Gerbasi

You've been there before...

The lights, the cheers, the girls falling at your feet even faster than your vanquished opponents...

You've been a champion. Even if only in your dreams, you've been Golden.

Whether you would like to admit it or not, as a boxing fan, you've dreamt of being in the ring. You dreamed of fighting the best on a world stage. Some of us have even climbed up those four steps into the ring. But it never turns out the way you've seen it in your dreams, does it?

See, when you win your imaginary titles, you don't dream of being a defensive wizard like Willie Pep or Pernell Whitaker. And certainly no one dreams of being Tex Cobb or Chuck Wepner. Even Holyfield and Tyson don't hold much appeal anymore.

When you dream, you're Oscar De La Hoya.

And you hate him for it.

You don't look like Oscar though. You may be White, Black, or Asian. You may be Puerto Rican or Dominican. But everything else fits in place. In your fantasy boxing ring, you never lose, the ladies love you, and even when you get marked up, it's not that bad. Sound familiar?

When you dream, you may get knocked down, like Oscar hit the floor against Ike Quartey. But in true dreamlike fashion, you will roar back to beat or stop your opponent.

When the slumber camera crew scans the crowd, all signs say "We Love You (fill in the blank)"

And you've got a punch that can lay the best of them out. You've got thunder in either hand, perfect for creating drama. And what's a dream without drama?

And dreamers don't talk trash, do they? They love the camera, and the camera loves them back. And as a bonus, my dreams don't have Larry Merchant ripping me or George Foreman ranting inanely about me.

But this dream may be ending.

See this real-life Golden Boy? He doesn't fight anyone unless they're crippled or collecting social security, he's a pretty boy, and he's ducking Tito Trinidad.

Or so "they" say.

On September 18, 1999, all bets may be off. Oscar De La Hoya may stop being an annoying figment of our imagination, and become real. He may leave the hometown judges back at the hotel and take matters into his own hands. He may lose, he may even get knocked cold. For Felix Trinidad awaits. And Trinidad is like a phone call in the middle of the night, a loud crash, or a garbage truck with a bad muffler. He'll wake you out of your dream. And you'll never get it back.

Oscar vs. Felix....We may never sleep the same again.

I don't hate you Oscar; I've just seen this story before. It's time for a new chapter.