By Cliff Rold
ep·i·logue: 1. a concluding part added to a literary work, as a novel;
2. a speech, usually in verse, delivered by one of the actors after the conclusion of a play
Like most fighters, most people, 37-year old former Middleweight titlist William Joppy (39-4-1, 30 KO) of Silver Springs, Maryland doesn’t want the end written for him. All but forgotten since a lopsided decision loss to then-future World Middleweight champion Jermain Taylor in December of 2004, this is likely Joppy’s last chance to delivery a more positive postmortem.
He shouldn’t need it. Three alphabet titles in a fifteen year career; pay-per-view headlines losses that no one could be ashamed of against future Hall of Fame entrants Bernard Hopkins and Felix Trinidad; by all rights a successful career in the squared circle. They should be enough to hang a hat on.
For Joppy, the failures in those two fights, the listless performance against Taylor, and turmoil in his life outside the ring leave him a man in search of an epilogue in his own words. A walk out from behind what was assumed to be the drawn curtain on his days as a serious world-class prizefighter to deliver the final statement on his terms.
The script is supposed to read otherwise. This Friday night at the Bell Center in Montreal, Canada is not supposed to be his stage. He will face 27-year old Romanian born but Canadian-based Lucien Bute (21-0, 17 KO) in Bute’s first defense of the IBF 168 lb. belt. This script is familiar: “fighter wins title; makes easy first defense to cash in against faded name.” Bute fighting from essentially his backyard is par for this course as well.
Joppy knows the script, having written a similar chapter himself once upon a time. In 1998, he faced a 47-year old version of all-time great Roberto Duran, stopping him in three rounds. Joppy doesn’t see much of a parallel to the past. “When I fought Duran I was 28, he was closer to fifty. This guy I’m fighting, he’s 26, he’s a younger guy but I’ve watched him fight. He’s not on my level. He’s big up there in Montreal but Montreal doesn’t have a lot of fighters come out of there. Hockey is their sport.”
He knows the thrill of defeating a local star in his backyard for a title. Joppy’s first of three WBA middleweight belts was won in Yokohama, Japan in October, 1996 against hometown favorite Shinji Takehara with a ninth-round stoppage. “He was big there. When I went to Japan, in his hometown, he couldn’t handle all that pressure. He was a handsome Japanese guy. Everyone was coming to see Shinji. ‘Shinji! Shinji!’ Cameras on Shinji. But I looked at him at a press conference and I said ‘He’s nervous. He can’t handle all this fame. I got this guy.’ I see that in this guy Lucien.”
Those who have seen Bute fight know that he’s no hockey player and, with several big drawing bouts already under his belt in Montreal, appears up to the pressure. A 6’2 southpaw with solid speed, power and craft, Bute is seen as one of the rising stars of the increasingly deep field at Super Middleweight and one of the chief candidates to replace World Champion Joe Calzaghe on top of the division some day. He’s regarded highly enough that most people see Bute-Joppy as a cruel mis-match, an example of the ills of boxing, the way it devours its aging own.
It’s a more than fair point.
Joppy doesn’t want to see it that way. He wills himself to believe he can be young again. Given some of the dark days that have dogged him in recent years, he’s earned the right to do so.
“The last couple of years of my career, since my loss to Trinidad (May 2001), I know I’ve been on the decline. But you know, I’ve been going through a lot of things in my life.”
Those “things” took away any chance he would have had to enjoy his shot, in December 2003, at the Undisputed Middleweight championship of the World. “When I fought Bernard Hopkins in 03, my daughter had just been killed.” That daughter, 5-week old Vashti Scotlyn Joppy, passed away in the summer of 2003 after a tragic accident. Her passing was followed by a slate of legal troubles.
“I was charged with first-degree assault. I had three warrants out for my arrest when I fought Bernard Hopkins. Let me tell you what happened. I was in the gym training for Hopkins and the repo man came to the gym to repossess my trainer, Adrian Davis, his wife’s mini-van. (Another fighter in the gym) beat the repo man up…repo man comes back and says I did it.”
“I fought the case for two years. I was going through all this, and my daughter being killed, when I fought Hopkins and Jermain Taylor. For two years, I spent almost $60,000 on a case where I didn’t even know what happened until two days later. All I know is the police picked me up, put me in lockup, and said I was being charged with assault.” He beat the charges, with the case being thrown out of court, but as Joppy astutely observed, “I beat it but I paid for it.”
With the past behind him, Joppy now looks forward to this Friday. Considering his age, and the many years that have passed since his last win against a legitimate top ten fighter (Howard Eastman in November 2001), a win over the youth and fury of Bute would stand out as a dramatic resurrection. Joppy is aware of what the fight looks like to the rest of the world.
“I’m in a good position right now. I’m 37. People think I’m at the end of my career. I just had a new son, Avon. You know how the boxing game goes, what happens when people think you’re getting older. For Bute, I’ve been working with young guys like Jean Pascal. Young, fast guys in the gym. I know what people think. I’m gonna’ show you. I have to be there for this fight. I have to show up like I’ve never shown up before.”
“This is it.”
“This is it.”
This is the epilogue for William Joppy.
Cliff Rold is a member of the Ring Magazine Ratings Advisory Panel and the Boxing Writers Association of America. He can be reached at roldboxing@hotmail.com