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A Star Is Born
By Bernard Fernandez
Now that Naazim Richardson has taken his place at the head table reserved for boxing’s celebrity trainers, you have to wonder if the road to recognition was like this for such legendary cornermen as Ray Arcel, Eddie Futch, Jack Blackburn, Cus D’Amato, Charley Goldman, Angelo Dundee and Emanuel Steward.
Great trainers, one would presume, must know how to properly condition their boxers, craft intelligent fight plans, make in-bout adjustments on the fly and push the proper buttons when extra motivation is needed at a critical moment. But is the ability to do all that always enough to gain a reputation as one of the sport’s finest teachers? How much is attributable to simply being in the right place at the right time? Having one or more gifted pupils whose high-visibility successes serve to illuminate your contributions?
Larry Holmes, after he had been heavyweight champion of the world for a good, long while, once offered the opinion that the shifting cast of characters in his corner were necessary evils, unable to add to or detract from the boxing acumen he had already accumulated. Others – such as Shane Mosley, who was lavish in his praise of Richardson after last Saturday night’s stunning, nine-round beatdown of Antonio Margarito – have no hesitancy in suggesting that the right voice in the gym and on fight night can be the deciding factor in any bout, all other factors being more or less equal.
Richardson, best known as a longstanding trainer of Bernard “The Executioner” Hopkins, but only occasionally in the lead role since 2005, became a hot commodity because his exquisite fight plan was followed so perfectly by Mosley against Margarito, and because his observations of the manner in which the “Tijuana Tornado’s” hands were wrapped before the fight led to the impounding of hard inserts in those wraps. The prefight drama in Margarito’s dressing room – the California commission at this date has yet to announce its findings -- at least hinted that the soon-to-be-dethroned WBA welterweight champion’s already formidable punching power sometimes has been enhanced by artificial means.
Considering that Richardson was at the forefront of another hand-wrap expose, when he successfully argued to New York State Athletic Commission officials that Felix Trinidad’s hands were illegally wrapped prior to his Sept. 29, 2001, middleweight unification showdown with Hopkins in Madison Square Garden (B-Hop won on a stunning, ninth-round stoppage), his increasingly high visibility might owe as much to his keen eye for possible rules infractions as well as for his more standard duties.
Like that noted baseball philosopher, Yogi Berra, once observed, it’s amazing how much you can see by looking.
That 1-2 punch delivered by Richardson – Mosley benefiting first from the dressing room flap, then from the tactical suggestions offered by his new trainer, for which Margarito’s chief second, Javier Capetillo, seemingly had no answer – vaulted the Philadelphian from the ranks of I-think-I’ve-heard-of-him trainers into elite status.
By the end of the seventh round, HBO blow-by-blow announcer Jim Lampley was advising viewers that every big-name fighter considering a change in his corner almost certainly would soon be putting Richardson on speed-dial.
By Bernard Fernandez
Now that Naazim Richardson has taken his place at the head table reserved for boxing’s celebrity trainers, you have to wonder if the road to recognition was like this for such legendary cornermen as Ray Arcel, Eddie Futch, Jack Blackburn, Cus D’Amato, Charley Goldman, Angelo Dundee and Emanuel Steward.
Great trainers, one would presume, must know how to properly condition their boxers, craft intelligent fight plans, make in-bout adjustments on the fly and push the proper buttons when extra motivation is needed at a critical moment. But is the ability to do all that always enough to gain a reputation as one of the sport’s finest teachers? How much is attributable to simply being in the right place at the right time? Having one or more gifted pupils whose high-visibility successes serve to illuminate your contributions?
Larry Holmes, after he had been heavyweight champion of the world for a good, long while, once offered the opinion that the shifting cast of characters in his corner were necessary evils, unable to add to or detract from the boxing acumen he had already accumulated. Others – such as Shane Mosley, who was lavish in his praise of Richardson after last Saturday night’s stunning, nine-round beatdown of Antonio Margarito – have no hesitancy in suggesting that the right voice in the gym and on fight night can be the deciding factor in any bout, all other factors being more or less equal.
Richardson, best known as a longstanding trainer of Bernard “The Executioner” Hopkins, but only occasionally in the lead role since 2005, became a hot commodity because his exquisite fight plan was followed so perfectly by Mosley against Margarito, and because his observations of the manner in which the “Tijuana Tornado’s” hands were wrapped before the fight led to the impounding of hard inserts in those wraps. The prefight drama in Margarito’s dressing room – the California commission at this date has yet to announce its findings -- at least hinted that the soon-to-be-dethroned WBA welterweight champion’s already formidable punching power sometimes has been enhanced by artificial means.
Considering that Richardson was at the forefront of another hand-wrap expose, when he successfully argued to New York State Athletic Commission officials that Felix Trinidad’s hands were illegally wrapped prior to his Sept. 29, 2001, middleweight unification showdown with Hopkins in Madison Square Garden (B-Hop won on a stunning, ninth-round stoppage), his increasingly high visibility might owe as much to his keen eye for possible rules infractions as well as for his more standard duties.
Like that noted baseball philosopher, Yogi Berra, once observed, it’s amazing how much you can see by looking.
That 1-2 punch delivered by Richardson – Mosley benefiting first from the dressing room flap, then from the tactical suggestions offered by his new trainer, for which Margarito’s chief second, Javier Capetillo, seemingly had no answer – vaulted the Philadelphian from the ranks of I-think-I’ve-heard-of-him trainers into elite status.
By the end of the seventh round, HBO blow-by-blow announcer Jim Lampley was advising viewers that every big-name fighter considering a change in his corner almost certainly would soon be putting Richardson on speed-dial.
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