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Chris Byrd's plight What's a guy have to do to get a title fight around here?Posted: Tuesday December 10, 2002 4:46 PM
So, Mr. Byrd, you want to fight for the heavyweight championship? Try your loosey-goosey style against Lennox Lewis, the man Don King calls the emperor of the division? See if you can’t frustrate the dickens out of the big man? It isn’t happening. Not yet, anyway. We’re not here to say Lewis is chicken -- not after he treated Mike Tyson like a tomato can last time he set foot in the ring -- but you wonder what’s behind his ducking of Chris Byrd. Word is Lewis accepted $1 million from King to give up his International Boxing Federation belt because he wanted no part of Byrd, a slippery southpaw capable of making him look clumsy. This is business as usual in the not-so-credible fight game. Rather than taking on the mandatory IBF challenge, Lewis will sit ringside Saturday night for the title fight on HBO between Byrd and four-time champion Evander Holyfield. If you believe King, and we’ll leave that to your discretion, the IBF champ gets the winner of John Ruiz-Roy Jones Jr., with the winner of that being sold the promise of a title unification bout against Lewis next summer. Byrd isn’t even buying it -- and he’s promoted by King, who also promotes Holyfield. As an interesting sidelight here, Byrd recently moved with his wife and three children into a small gated community in Las Vegas. It wasn’t until after purchasing the place that he learned the neighbor directly across the street -- the one whose abode takes up half the block -- is Mr. King. That doesn’t guarantee any neighborly favors, though. In fact, the way Byrd hears it, if Jones should win, he’s willing to fight Holyfield. But he, too, wants no part of the smallish heavyweight. At least that's Byrd’s opinion. “Man, they just hate my style of boxing," Byrd sighs. “My style poses a problem for anybody that is in the division. Nobody wants to get embarrassed and lose at the same time. It has been frustrating for a long time. Like since I was 10-0, it’s been hard to get fights." The biggest offender? No question -- Lewis. Lewis ducked a mandatory defense against Byrd, saying his team felt there was “no public interest" in the fight. Then he tossed out a line about Byrd “offering no competitive challenge to me." That’s fine, except Lewis is next booked against Vitali Klitschko, a 6-foot-8 Ukrainian who was stopped by Byrd for the WBO title two years ago. “Rather than fight me, he made up excuses like a coward," Byrd says. “After he beat Mike Tyson, people say, ‘He’s the best out there.’ Of course, he is the champion. But if you are champ, you fight everybody. He knows I pose just so many problems, cause he is getting older and he is very slow. I mean he falls right into my hands. “I’m somebody that is going to embarrass the mess out of him. He wouldn’t get a hand on me. He wouldn’t hit me. Never. “Now he’s going to fight somebody that quit on the stool against me. And I am not worthy to fight you? He makes himself look stupid." So Byrd (35-2, 20 KOs) has to try to raise his profile opposite Holyfield (38-5-2, 25 KOs), another gutsy warrior who never ducked a challenge. Of course, the only reason “The Real Deal" has made his way to Atlantic City is for the shot at another title belt, with his long-term goal to retire as the undisputed heavyweight champion. Byrd, who grew up in Flint, Mich., around his father Joe's fight gym, fancies himself a younger, left-handed version of Holyfield -- small by heavyweight standards, not a big puncher but courageous to a fault. He first met Holyfield at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona, when the then-heavyweight champ stopped by to offer encouragement. “At that time, I was sizing him up and he didn’t even know," laughs Byrd, silver medalist in the 165-pound division. “I’m saying, ‘Man, he is heavyweight champ, he don’t look too big. We are the same height.’ So I knew I could do same thing he is doing." Thankfully for Byrd, this isn’t the Holyfield of a decade ago. Courageous as ever, yes, but a boxer with lots of miles on the odometer, thanks to fights with every top heavyweight of his era, guys like Tyson, Lewis and Riddick Bowe. Even at 40, he remains a physical freak, more impressive-looking in the ring than guys half his age. Only he isn’t the fighter of old, relying more than ever on his smarts and fighting in late round spurts to impress the judges. And his weak points? “Age, man," Byrd says. “You can be in great shape, but you get tired faster, of course. From watching him when he was young, he’s lost a little speed and reflexes. He’s still very determined, so that gets him over the hump. He’s just a little easier to hit now." No one-punch knockout artist, Byrd aims to outwork Holyfield. Push the pace of the fight. Make him throw punches in hopes of tiring him. Leave no doubt in the minds of the judging trio. If it comes down to a PR war or a personality contest, Byrd doesn’t need to be told that he’s doomed. “What he has is a name," Byrd says. “His name alone puts him up two rounds. So I better impress to where the judges say, ‘You’re whipped this time, Evander.'" You figure that should be enough. Then again, this is professional boxing Mike Fish is a senior writer for CNNSI.com.
Comments? To e-mail Fish, click here.
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