Boxer quotes thread

[JAB5239]

'When at a young age you learn to face your fears, that makes the difference between people being champions and people not being champions.'
- Evander Holyfield

[JAB5239]

'I'm so tough I chew nails and spit rust.'

- Lou Ambers

[JAB5239]

'There is so much hate among people, so much contempt inside people who'd like you to think they're moral, that they have to hire prizefighters to do their hating for them. And we do. We get into a ring and act out other people's hates.'
- Floyd Patterson

[JAB5239]

'Beginning on Nov. 9, 1938, for four days, Max Schmeling hid my brother and me in his Berlin apartment. That was the night known now as ‘the Crystal Night,’ when the Gestapo began picking up all Jews off the streets. Max Schmeling risked everything he had for us. If we had been found in his apartment, I would not be here this evening and neither would Max. And that, friends, is the kind of champion Max Schmeling is.'
- Henri Lewin

[JAB5239]

'After you reach a goal, you want to keep on growing. I love fighting. I always say you have to enjoy it like a boy, but play it like a man. I have nothing else. This is all I've got. I've got to be the best.'
- Marvelous Marvin Hagler

[JAB5239]

'Don’t make training easy. Make it harder so that you will get better.'

- Manny Pacquiao

[JAB5239]

'Power is more than the punch. I get so much power and belief in myself from God, and from God the power passes through my legs, through my hips, up to my shoulders, through my arms, and into my fists. I'm written to be a legend.'

- Naseem Hamed

[JAB5239]

'I always felt Duran could have been at the top of any lightweight division. If not the champion, then he would have been a leading contender.
I feel Duran could have fit into that great group of lightweights during the 1917 period. He could have held his own with all the champions who followed Benny Leonard. I know there are many who will dispute this.

He has learned the element of surprise very well. He can confuse an opponent and can box as well as fight. Duran suffered as a lightweight because of a genuine lack of good competition. When he was the titlist the division was at its lowest ebb, I believe, in its history.'

- Ray Arcel

[JAB5239]

'From the time I was six, possibly even before, I wanted to fight anyone. Other kids would dare me; 'Betcha can't beat him.' 'Betcha I can,' I'd reply. I'd provoke two or three guys, I didn't care. I just wanted to mix it up. I never lost. By Junior High the violence had become second nature. Everyone knew my reputation, and it was a reputation I cultivated.'

- George Foreman

[JAB5239]

'We ate poorly, had very few clothes, and worked too hard. I fed pigs, chopped wood, worked in sugar beet fields, shined shoes in barber shops, helped pitch circus tents and move heavy equipment, and even shovelled dung. But all in all, I don't regret having grown up that way. It made me tough and well prepared for the life ahead. I was never ill or down with sickness. My body became tough as leather.'
- Jack Dempsey