The Great Black Hope
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.
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.
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