Which un-timely death in boxing do you find the most tragic?

[ROSS CALIFORNIA]

Valero and Sanchez, because they died before reaching their fullest potential.

[ronnie_N.]

valero....

[dj Calleti]

I weeped for Gatti and Valero.

[LeG00N]

Valero no doubt 100% K0 ratio

[GoogleMe]

No life is worth more than another! Annoying thread!

[MRBOOMER]

Corrales but he died how fought careless drinking on a motorcycle I mean come on its a Shame tho

[Bushbaby]

Vernon Forrest & Salvador Sanchez.

[Cloud]

During a Career:

..Not sure to be honest.

In Retirement:

James Oyebola - 6'9'' Heavyweight

WBC International Heavyweight Champion
BBBofC Southern Area Champion
BBBofC British Champion
Commonwealth Title Contender


He was never great but very exciting, courageous and a proper gentleman. He went to assist some doormen that were asking some arseholes to put out their cigs. They shot him in the leg and face and he later died after his family agreed to turn off his life support.

He left his wife and children behind. I believe they set up a foundation or something.

[Dubblechin]

Boy, 10 years ago, if you said Julio Gonzales, Julian Letterlough, Diego Corrales, Arturo Gatti and Vernon Forrest would "all" be dead within the decade, people would've thought some catastrophic event must have taken place.

I don't recall anything like that since the early 80s, when Salvador Sanchez, Johnny Owen, Victor Galindez, and Cleveland Denny died.

But I don't consider the Corrales, Gatti, Forrest, Letterlough and Gonzales stuff "the most" tragic because most were at the ends of their careers or retired. So was Galindez.

The one that's always bothered me the most was the U.S. Olympic boxing team dying in a plane crash in 1980. That was back when boxing was at it's peak in terms of mainstream popularity. Everyone watched pro AND amateur boxing.

Big things were expected of that team. The 1976 team was considered the best U.S. Olympic team ever. The 1980 team was considered just as strong. Lem Steeples had won the Pan American Games. He was already becoming a superstar and the favorite to win Gold. Carlos Palomino's brother, Paul, was on the team. He died. Fourteen boxers and the coach of the 1976 Team Sarge Johnson were all killed. Future champs Bobby Czyz and Tony Tucker missed the flight.

A couple months later, President Carter announced the U.S. would boycott the Olympics, but they held the boxing trials anyway. Future champs like Donald Curry, Johnny Bumphus, Richie Sandoval, and top contenders like James Shuler made the team after everyone else died.

When fourteen possible future stars and the country's top boxing coach. all die on the same day ... that's huge. And, four or five years later, boxing started disappearing from network television in the U.S. A lot of factors contributed to that, but you can't overlook the fact that 14 of the top young U.S. fighters at the start of that decade never turned pro.

Can you imagine if that had happened to the 84 team, and how different the sport would've been without Evander Holyfield, and Pernell Whitaker and Meldrick Taylor, etc.? That 1980 crash was a huge loss. Even the guys who DIDN'T make the flight and WEREN'T good enough to go to Poland became champs.

[StopBlocking]

Valero got no sympathy from me based on the crime he committed.

I was a few miles away from were Forrest was killed that night in Atlanta so that made the news more shocking to me. But i'd probably go with Diego, boxing hasn't been the same without him.