Here I actually intoned the name of the great Clifford Etienne this morning in my Calvin Brock post without any idea that my boy Cliff was in so much trouble. The news just came over the wires that the Black Rhino got himself a 150-year prison sentence today.

I know what you’re thinking, but no, they did not finally bust his ass for stealing money at that fight he had with Tyson where he laid down 49 seconds into the first round after Tyson looked at him crosseyed. ‘Black Hippo is more like it,” a friend of mine said at the time, and I think he spoke for all of us.

That offense, however, remains unpunished. Etienne now has 150 years of solitude on his hands due to a bit of business down in Baton Rouge, a crime spree that involved some Rhino-plastery at a check-cashing joint, followed by a couple of botched hijackings involving small children and, oh yeah, the whole trying-to-kill-two-cops-but-my-fucking-stupid-gun-jammed escapade, which evidently did not endear him to anyone, particularly cops.

Word is that Cliff’s lawyers hit the jury with the old ‘brain damage on the mike don’t manage” defense, throwing in just a dollop of ‘hey, look, brother was stupid high.” No dice. One-fiddy.

Which only goes to show what you get in this world when you’re just a lowly Black Rhino and not the Godfather of Soul. I mean, shit, that Etienne ‘crime spree” was just going out to get breakfast for motherfuckin James Brown back in the day. The Man never threw his ass in jail for a century plus. A couple years here and there, yeah, but never the one-fizzle-dizzle. C’mon, Baton Rouge, free your minds. To quote JB himself , ‘A man can’t do nothing no more…”

Kim Colbert’s split decision over Maureen O’Shea last month at the Hammerstein Ballroom will not stand. The decision was changed to No Contest when Colbert tested positive for marijuana post fight.

Colbert is memorable for her basketball shoes and for inspiring cries of “damn she a crackhead” from the Hammerstein faithful. What Colbert lacked in skill and discipline, she made up for with outrageous taunts and a street fighter’s flair. In the end, she won the hearts of a hostile Hammerstein crowd.

No Mas looks forward to Kim Colbert’s return to the ring.

I saw Calvin Brock’s only fight at the Sydney Olympics. I remember I was excited about it, because all of the buzz going in was directed at the U.S. heavyweight, Michael Bennett, a jailbird turned fighter who everyone thought would challenge Savon (he didn’t). But some NBC boxing guru type had alerted me to Brock at super heavy, telling me he had skills out the ass and had the killer instinct, etc. So I went to check out his first fight, thinking I’d get on the Brock train early.

It was a disaster. I can’t remember who he fought, but he was thoroughly dominated, out of the tournament after a tepid cup of coffee. He looked like a clumsy amateur with no speed, no power, and no footwork. I was sorry I’d wasted my time making the long trek to Darling Harbour.

(A side note about the 2000 super heavyweight tournament , Great Britain’s Audley Harrison won, and in his victory press conference he quoted Pierre Corneille: ‘Triumph without risk is triumph without glory.” If British boxers could only tear themselves away from reading French playwrights, they might actually win a title belt one of these centuries.)

This being my experience of Calvin Brock, I was awfully skeptical when I started hearing that he was emerging as potentially the man to unify the heavyweight belts and bring some clarity to the division. I thought, are we talking about the same Calvin Brock here? The fighter possessed of the worst nickname in the history of the sport , ‘The Boxing Banker”?

One and the same.

Brock is undefeated, 28-0 with 22 ko’s, but he has only two recognizable names on his resume , Clifford ‘The Black Rhino” Etienne, he of the infamous first round Tyson knockout, and Big Time Jameel McCline. Both of those fights were in 2005 , since then he’s fought three palookas and picked himself up a meaningless alphabet belt, the coveted IBA heavyweight crown.

In the McCline fight, I was very impressed with Brock. McCline is not George Foreman, or even Oscar Bonavena, but he poses a problem just for being so fucking big, and for being such a big guy, being surprisingly far from a slow guy. Brock showed a range of skills, speed and accuracy on the outside, craftiness and durability inside, legitimate power and a good set of lungs. More than anything, he showed guts. McCline put him on the canvas in the 8th and Brock got up, clearly staggered, and fought back with fury. He had McCline on queer street by round’s end. I haven’t seen that kind of urgency from a heavyweight in years.

Saturday night Brock fights Timor Ibragimov, another of the seemingly endless string of Eastern Europeans populating the heavyweight ranks these days (things must be rough over there , they’re churning out fighters faster than they’re churning out strippers). A victory would put Brock in line for the title, possibly in a fight with Klitschko, and oh how I yearn for someone to knock the stuffing out of that paper tiger. So I’ve done a complete 180 on Brock – I’m now in the provisional fan club. He’s not going to change the world, but he has all the tools, and I think he has the heart. He may be the guy we’ve been waiting for, at least to tide us over for a while.

I find few things as joyful as rooting for the underdog. In a world of Yankee fans, give me the Dodgers. Go ahead and buy a new T.O. Cowboys jersey, I’ll stick with my beloved Browns and Bernie Kosar. So when the US lost yesterday to Ghana, I was overjoyed. In futbol terms Ghana may not have been an underdog, but we all know sports is political. I’m no sports patriot, so when any poor African nation defeats the US, all my psuedo-socialist and radical tendencies are given voice. You see, I heard a lot of people assuming we’d beat Ghana because they were a poor nation that could hardly afford to water their pitch. There was a blatant elitism/racism to the assumption that just because Ghana lacks Appleby’s and Verizon that they wouldn’t be able to beat the mighty US. Now, I know Ghana’s victory over a crappy US side doesn’t redress the centuries of imperialism and colonialism suffered in Africa, but whenever America is shown that she isn’t as good as she thinks she is, I feel that a little bit a justice has been done. Do you think it’s only a coincidence that the US was eliminated from the World Cup the same week as Congress chose not to raise the minimum wage and postponed renewing the Voting Rights Act? I don’t. These things are connected. Maybe if the US were more pro-immigrant we could finally get some decent players una puta vez (are Landon Donovan or Eddie Pope even good enough for the J-League?) So, I’m glad that a bunch of nappy haired Africans put the US out of the World Cup. We deserved it, and with our pathetic style of play, I hope we don’t qualify for South Africa in 2010 either. Recently the Japanese beat us in the baseball classic, the Argentinos took us to school in hoops, and now Ghana proved just how bad we suck at futbol. Now maybe we’ll wise up and stop referring to our teams as “world champs”. As for the continent of Africa, many will go to bed on empty stomachs tonite, but their hearts are filled of joy….the kind of joy that you can only get from punching a bully in the throat.

*************
Ed note: Another reason to like Ghana, for Germanophobic like Ariel and, is semitophilie defender John Pantsil, who hoisted the Israeli flag after Ghana beat the Czechs. Predictably, Israelis are loving them some Ghana and Arab countries are outraged.

When I last walked into the Sweetwater Tavern, my lifestyle was decidedly different, and so was the Tavern’s. Once THE hole-in-the-wall tattoo parlor of a bar for all of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, it’s now an attractive and respectable bistro-ish joint revered by hoodrats for both cuisine and atmosphere. I’ll refrain from speculating on whether I myself have evolved so gracefully.

The scene in there was straight-up Argentina, many sporting the blue and white strip, a whole contingent of the faithful sitting in the backroom glued to the pre-game on a six-foot screen.

At a table was an old Argentinian friend of mine, Santiago. When I came in I did not see him, and he greeted me warmly from his perch.

‘Santi,” I said, ‘you’re here.”

‘Of course,” he deadpanned, and I saw his point.

We small-talked it for a while but his heart wasn’t in it, and I left him to his business. Ten minutes to kickoff and his eyes had The Glow. He was elsewhere.

Two of the three owners of the place are Argentinians, the bartender told me. One of these owners prowled about in his Argentina jersey looking preoccupied, talking to anyone who would listen, laughing and drinking and gesturing aimlessly. As the first half wore on, with more fiery exchanges and up-and-down runs than you’d expect in an essentially meaningless match, the Tavern vibe turned from attentive to passionate to boisterous. By the 25th minute, the place was standing-room-only. Admirably loud, as well.

There was a World Cup special, two empanadas and a beer for ten beans. I substituted an espresso for the beer and was happy as an Argentinian lamb. The empanadas were rich and flaky, the espresso was as good as I’ve had in months, and I washed it all down with a bitters and soda just as the halftime whistle blew. I felt well-cared-for on the whole. You want to watch an Argentina match in the Burg, I tell you folks, you may as well do it there.

For the second half, I biked over to Marlow and Sons, the ultra-hip grocery store/oyster bar on Broadway that adjoins the beloved Broadway Diner. Same owners, both places possessed of the same effortless style. The Marlow pub was filled with locals watching the match, and though there was nary an Argy in sight, there weren’t a lot of Americans either. An ex-pat mood prevailed, accents clashed. An Englishman sat down at a table with his mates and some indefinable Euro said to him, ‘Congratulations, you’re through,” to which John Bull rolled his eyes. ‘Yeah, thrilling innit. I think we’ll go all the way.”

I suspected him of sarcasm.

Football conversations abounded. The demise of Michael Owen. One striker versus two. Americans chances with the Ghanaians. Should Argy have shelved Requelme. Announcers are crap aren’t they? British announcers, now they know football…

I had a mint tea and a rhubarb muffin from the front grocery, and though the earth did not move with my selections, I was all in all satisfied. As the play wound down and it became clear that the two sides were content to draw, John Bull offered his opinion for general consumption. ‘Dunna look like they’re even tryin does it?” Agreed mate, but still, if that’s what not trying looks like, let’s just give Argentina the Cup now and get back to our lives.

A postscript , the overall attractiveness of the patrons at these two venues was off the charts. Women abounded at each locale, beautiful women with unkempt hair and a continental air of availability and poise. Especially at Marlow, this was true of the lasses, and meanwhile, the lads were all Lads, scruffy and unconcerned and a hair’s breadth from underwear modeling. On a scale of one to ten, it is my impression that I am a solid six, and I was easily the ugliest fucker in that place. Football Lotharios, you have been warned. Don’t any of you five-and-unders head to Marlow and Sons with a flatmate in mind.

Jetlagged, famished and fed up at last with ESPN’s broadcasting duo (who ARE these numbskulls? is this really the best they can do?), I rode my bike to my favorite Mexican diner to watch the second half of the Mexico/Portugal game.

The Acapulco Deli is one of those local jewels that make living nearby seem like it’s worth at least a hundred or two dollars worth of rising Brooklyn rents. It’s cheap (and like, 1996 cheap, you feel me), the food is great, it’s clean and spacious… basically, it should be on the fucking cover of Zagat’s for Best Everything, and that’s why one thing this missive will not contain is an address. Some things are sacred.

The late morning crowd was a mix of Mexicanos and stragglers from the nearby uber-artist warehouse. No one in the place was not watching the match, and that included the lone, scrambling waitress. A tense atmosphere presided. The cook, in particular, who in my years of patronage has NEVER taken a day off, and who can single-handedly feed ten tables and a full load at the counter and still seem like he’s in third gear, like he’s working but not really ‘working”… this Rock of Gibraltar seemed agitated on the whole, and his first lieutenant was positively shattered.

At one table sat a lonely, pony-tailed Mexico supporter, sipping his first Corona of the day and having his say at regular intervals. Despite not understanding any of his running commentary, there is no doubt in my mind as to his type. There were swarms of them populating the Vet of my childhood. The Phils are leading the division, Carlton’s on the mound, first inning, first pitch, ball one, and it’s ‘oh you fuckin bum you must be kidding me.” With some people, sports are just another outlet for their long litany of discontents.

Mexican workmen speckled with drywall dust came in and out for the seemingly endless Cokes they drink in a day. They stared at the television and yelled things at the cook, who yelled back at them. Things reached a crescendo around the time of Bravo’s penalty kick, and when it sailed over the crossbar, the mood shifted from anxiety to resignation. The cook said ‘el stupido!” and then turned back to his empire, peering at the tube over his shoulder now and then but without much purpose. The news that Iran had evened their match with Angola brought the room back to life, and when that result held, and Mexico was assured its place in the next round, all the angst of the morning was gone like breakfast. The noon sun was high, there was a breeze in the air, and the Acapulco Deli had lived to fight another day.

I missed the Winky/Jermain fight live, because I was in France, so here is my belated commentary.

A side note , I was not so naïve as actually to have hoped that I would be able to see the fight over there, but I did think maybe I would be able to find some mention of it in the popular French media. Not the results (I decidedly avoided the results), and not some big write-up, but just a small one-sentence mention somewhere of the existence of a middleweight title fight of import taking place in the States.

Perhaps I was looking in the wrong places. I hope so. Marcel Cerdan, ou et vous?

I Tivo’ed the fight of course, and so when I got home yesterday, the very first thing I did was watch it. Actually, the VERY first thing I did was call my parents to let them know that I was home safe, which was nearly a costly mistake. My dad: ‘How about that Winky/Jermain fight, JESUS…” I cut him off just in time.

I was immensely pleased by the bout, and if you are a fight fan, I imagine that you were too. The contrasting styles, Winky’s thoughtfulness and experience pitted against Jermain’s clumsy but explosive lunges , it was perfect boxing theater.

It surprised me that Winky traded with Jermain so willingly, and though he fared better in this approach than I ever would have expected, ultimately it cost him what could have been an easy decision. Had he played Ray Leonard to Jermain’s Hagler, he might have embarrassed Jermain. Had he done this just for the first six to eight rounds, he would have won in a rout. As the fateful last round showed, Jermain had no answer for Winky up on his toes, boxing and sticking that indefatigable right jab. It was certainly a mistake for Winky to resort to that style in the last round of the fight given the tone of the past 11 rounds. That’s always a sin in the eyes of the judges, particularly when you are the challenger, and it’s hard to imagine any fighter actually managing to convince himself that it is otherwise. De la Hoya, Trinidad, etc.

But if Winky had set this tone from the outset, he would have had Jermain exasperated and exhausted by the final third of the fight, at which point he could have imposed his will. The true matador wearies the bull before he plunges the sword. Jermain Taylor is a bull of the highest order, powerful, furious, but also as technically unsound a fighter as you’ll ever see defending a unified title. Winky had all the tools at his command to expose Taylor had he so chosen, but I suspect that hubris got the better of him. For eleven rounds Saturday night, the bullfight was just two bulls. A draw was a fitting end to the occasion.

It all starts next Saturday, June 24th, at The Ultimate Finale Live on Spike TV with the finals of ‘The Ultimate Fighter 3.” If you haven’t been watching TUF 3 – you are really missing out. It’s the UFC version of ‘The Contender,” only without Rocky Balboa and Ray Leonard and their disgusting facelifts. (Much love to Spike, by the way, for all the UFC love). ‘The Pride of Maui” Kendall Grove goes up against Ed ‘Short Fuse” Herman for the Middleweight contract. Grove is 6”6 and has amazing kicking power while Herman was one of the best overall fighters on the show. He also trains with the legendary Randy Couture so you know he is for real.

In the light heavyweight fight, Josh Haynes takes on Michael ‘The Count” Bisping. I can’t wait for this one. Haynes is a tough guy who has lost over 100 pounds in the past year and the Liverpudlian Bisping was my all-around favorite fighter on the show for his no-nonsense English attitude and wrestling skills.

Spike brings us more UFC on Wednesday, June 28th with Ultimate Fight Night Live. The featured bouts are Chris ‘The Crippler” Leben going up against Anderson Silva and Rashad Evans clashing with ‘The American Psycho” Stephan Bonnar. The Bonnar-Evans fight should be a corker. Not only does it feature two former TUF cast members but it marks Bonnar’s return to cable television. Last year, he was involved in one of the greatest fights in UFC history when he lost to Forrest Griffin in the finals of TUF 1.

Finally, the main dish comes to us on Pay-Per-View on July 8th, which, not coincidentally, is also my birthday. Don’t give me any presents, parties, dinners or loot bags. Just give me Ortiz-Shamrock II and Arlovski-Sylvia III. You feel me? I mean, this card would be amazing if it only had the Arlovski-Sylvia bout, the conclusion to one of the greatest trilogies in mixed-martial-arts history. But the fact that Ken Shamrock, one of the true UFC pioneers, is stepping back into the octagon to shut up his long-time nemesis, ‘The Huntington Beach Bad Boy” Tito Ortiz, is enough to make me salivate.

I conclude with some advice from the august Dr. Dre: ‘Sit back, relax, grab on your seatbelt / You’ve never been on a ride like this before.” Word.

We already put you up on the book, and it is now our pleasure to invite you to the opening of “The African Game” gallery show:

Please join us this Thursday night in the BK and help us celebrate the excellent work of our comrades-in-arms Lee Harrison and Knox Robinson and the amazing photography of Andrew Dosunmu. There will be a conversation with Knox and Trace mag editor Claude Grunitzky at 7 about “Art, Life, and Futbol” in Africa, and if you want to be a smartass, you can ask Knox why it’s looking like no African eleven is going to make it past the first round. Apres-conversay, they got DJs and presumably some free wine and a cheese plate or two.

We would love to see you there.

The Rotunda Gallery
33 Clinton Street (off Pierrepoint)
(718) 875-4047
Thursday, June 22nd
6-9PM

…despite photographic evidence that suggests I tried my best.

My man Roger Bennett, author of Bar Mitzvah Disco, is hard at work on a not-so-top-secret Summer Camp project. I contributed a shot from my time at Lee Mazzilli All-American Baseball Camp. That’s me circa ’81-’82, top row, far left right next to Cerone.

With the benefits of hindsight, I’d like to make a few points:

• The young I-Berg’s epicurean uni predelictions are already fully formed. While these other little douchebirds trot out the usual suspects–Mets, Red Sox and, horror of horrors, USA–I have to give retroprops to myself for going with not just one but both kandy koated NL delights. You think fatboy top row fourth from left has any idea where Montreal is?

• Slightly more worrying is the acutely Lamarish plunge to the neck-line I have going on the Astros shirt. If you look closely you can see that I have achieved this with a complex side-knotting system. I’d like to claim this was entirely utilitarian (perhaps I was missing a belt), but it does seem more likely I was trying to elbow out the kid in the v-neck with some kind of precocious jailyard power move for Cerone’s attentions. I’ll show you V-Neck, bitch!

• Kudos to Cerone on the Tron-influenced Adidas jump off, but retrosnaps to Left Coach for the camelcock hot pants. I hope there was a coaches’ bet to see who could show more nutsack in the group picture, but something tells me this was simply the era before they did police background checks. Scary. This dude definitely invited someone over for ice cream.

• An interesting historical footnote to this image was that Cerone’s visit to Mazzilli’s camp came right in the middle of their alleged battle for the title of “The Real Italian Stallion”. Twenty-five years later, it’s still a great topic for debate, but oh to have been either one of them in the last window of decadence before AIDS. You know that when they get together all they talk about is all the studio-54-natural-breast-squeezing they did from ’77-’82. My second grade teacher Amy Shudlock Rainbow was so hot for Maz she would give you fifty cards for a Mazzilli, which of course made finding Mazzilli in a wax pack a greater cause for celebration than it might have been otherwise.

Separated at Birth:
Cerone vs. Gabe Kaplan.

Mazzilli vs. Tony D’Anunzio.