THE GLORY OF THE GARDEN
which included Evander Holyfield, Pernell Whitaker and Meldrick Taylor, all turned professional on the same card after medaling. Puerto Rican heroes Felix Trinidad and Miguel Cotto made the location their home away from home. If you’re a hardcore fight fan, the mere sight of MSG is special. While I’d been inside the building during a prior visit to New York City in 2002, I’d never attended a fight at Madison Square Garden. I’d done MGM Grand, T-Mobile, Staples, Wembley Stadium, Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, but never the Mecca of Boxing. MSG is hallowed ground to me and had been on the bucket list for decades. So, when the opportunity to attend the stacked Ring 6 card headlined by Teofimo Lopez vs. Shakur Stevenson came up, I was on cloud nine. And not only would I attend my first boxing event at MSG, but I would also attend the most prominent boxing awards ceremony, The Ring Gala, the night before. It was an unforgettable experience, but not without its challenges. IT’S BRICK OUTSIDE! I’d never heard this expression and had to look it up when The Ring’s editor-in-chief, Doug Fischer, said it to me in New York. The Google explanation for “It’s brick outside!” is “harsh, unforgiving weather.” I can endorse that. When I walked out of JFK airport, my entire body seized up as the cold cut right through me. I was wearing multiple layers, a hat, a scarf, gloves, the works. It made no difference. Being from Scotland, I thought I was up to speed on dealing with low temperatures. We’re lucky to get three weeks of sunshine a year where I live, so bad weather is expected and even embraced. This was next level. During the one-hour ride into Times Square, I noticed that snow was stacked so high at the sides of the road that some cars
had been completely engulfed and left abandoned. It was a surreal sight. Later in the week, I was halfway through my 15-minute walk to my hotel from Jimmy’s Corner, the famed boxing-themed bar in Midtown Manhattan, when the cold became almost unbearable. Despite not being hungry, I popped into a pizza place to split up the sub-zero ordeal, almost like I was taking a time-out. By the time I got back to my hotel, my pepperoni slice was frozen solid.
surrounding waterways and unblocked Arctic air masses from Canada.” I can take most of that in, but I’m not a meteorologist, so all I can confirm is that it was damn cold. THE GALA During the awards ceremony at Cipriani 25 Broadway, yours truly was assigned to speak to the winners as they came offstage following their acceptance speeches. The Ring’s junior bantamweight champion, Mizuki Hiruta, stole the show when she scooped the Female Fighter of the Year award and was overcome with emotion onstage. As well as being a force of nature inside the ring, Hiruta is effortlessly charismatic and looks destined for stardom in her home country of Japan and beyond. The final award was what everyone was waiting for. The male Fighter of the Year is the most coveted of all the Ring awards and carries the most history and prestige. Among its past recipients are all-time greats like Ali, Henry Armstrong, Ezzard Charles, Joe Louis, Sugar Ray Robinson and Sugar Ray Leonard. For 2025, the nominees were Terence Crawford, Naoya Inoue, Dmitry Bivol, Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez and Fabio Wardley. As we all know, “Bud” Crawford was the deserved winner. The recently retired ex- champ came off stage, posed for some photographs and then stepped forward for a quick interview. I congratulated the three-time undisputed king on winning his first Fighter of the Year award … and then it happened. “This isn’t my first time,” said Crawford. Remember the way the cold hit me coming out of JFK? Yes, this was similar. I tried again: “The first Ring Magazine Fighter of the Year award?” The champ doubled down, “It’s not my first Ring Magazine award.” Now, I’d done my due diligence in the lead-up to this event,
Bruce Carrington scored an early KO of the Year candidate vs. Carlos Castro.
but when an all-time great fighter is telling you that you’re wrong, you quickly lose confidence. I conceded that I may have made a mistake, the champ took pity on me, and we moved on. After the interview concluded, I followed Crawford to double-check my information. By this time, IBF junior welterweight titleholder Richardson Hitchins was joking around with him, saying that Crawford was too small to fight. Not one to take infringements lightly, Crawford looked Hitchins dead in the eye and said repeatedly, “I’m much bigger than you!” Hitchins, perhaps wisely, moved in for a hug. Crawford headed back to his seat, assuring me once again that he’d won the Ring Fighter of the Year award before. Now that I’m out of punching range, I must take the time to assure the great former champ that this was indeed his first Ring Magazine Fighter of the Year award. Crawford has won a record four Ring championships, but his Fighter of the Year honors came from other
outlets, such as ESPN and the BWAA. You can’t blame Crawford for getting this one wrong. He’s won so much that it must be difficult to keep up. As I said to him before wrapping up the interview: “The epitome of greatness. Nobody does it better!” Enjoy retirement and your beautiful family, champ! FIGHT NIGHT For fight night, I wrapped up and took the 10-minute walk to MSG. I’d actually been at The Theater for the final press conference on Thursday, but that was uneventful except for “Shu Shu” Carrington’s father rolling his ankle on a set of arena steps before falling flat on his back in front of me and The Ring’s creative director, Lamar Clark. It was really nasty. Two members of Shu Shu’s team and I helped Bruce Sr. to his feet and got him to a chair. He was OK by the time I left. When I entered the arena on Saturday, I felt giddy. “Ali fought Frazier
in here” kept racing through my mind. I walked around for a while, taking in the sights and sounds, then went to a bar area. Soon, Dalton Smith, who recently claimed the WBC junior welterweight title by smashing Subriel Matias, arrived along with his manager, Sean O’Toole, and Callum Smith, the former Ring Magazine super middleweight champion and light heavyweight contender. I’ve known Callum since he was a young prospect, and he’s a superfreak when it comes to boxing history. We immediately struck up a conversation, went through the decades, up and down the divisions and back again. All the while, Dalton Smith couldn’t have looked less interested. You won’t meet a more down-to-earth and amiable athlete than Dalton, but after a 12-week training camp and a brutal
Mizuki Hiruta’s unbridled joy was a highlight of the awards gala.
On the day of the fight, I went to a nearby pharmacy and spotted a man lying in the street, homeless. I immediately felt guilty for complaining, gave him $20 and told him to get some hot food. The last time I checked, 17 people had died on the streets of New York during this cold snap, which is a tragedy beyond measure. According to A.I., New York feels colder because of “high humidity,
48 RINGMAGAZINE.COM
RINGMAGAZINE.COM 49
Made with FlippingBook - Online magazine maker