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GARY SHAW: "ANGULO REMINDED ME OF JEFF LACY...HE WILL NEVER BE THE SAME FIGHTER"

By Ben Thompson | November 06, 2011
GARY SHAW:

"Angulo reminded me of Jeff Lacy. He never gave John Beninati and GSP [Gary Shaw Productions] credit for rounding up the right opponents in his career. We all knew who Angulo was...No professional fighter at that level should shoot an entire load in one round to where you're done for the rest of the fight. You know, that's not true. Pacquiao throws a lot of punches, a lot, and he's not done. There are other fighters that are more conservative in their punches, but to me, it's all about good karma...Angulo was just not a good person and good karma beat him...That fight was set up for Angulo. It was to sacrifice Kirkland. I think Golden Boy is in shock today, Miller must be in shock today, and Cameron must be in shock today, you know, because the wrong guy won. I mean, if you think Kirkland is what he is, you don't bring him to Mexico to the fight. Now we'll see if HBO goes back there for Angulo. We'll see how fast they're running back for Angulo. I don't believe Angulo will ever be the same. Just like Lacy was never the same, he will never be the same fighter," stated promoter Gary Shaw, who shared his thoughts on this past Saturday's barnburner between James Kirkland and Alfredo Angulo, two fighters that Shaw once promoted. You don't want to miss what else he had to say. Check it out!

BT: What's going on Gary?

GS: Not much. What a fight!

BT: Yeah, that was definitely a barnburner.

GS: Well, being that I promoted both guys at one time, I always knew it would be a barnburner. It was interesting.

BT: It was definitely entertaining. I think Kirkland still has a few things he needs to work on, he's still walking into those right hands, but Angulo, yikes, that was kind of ugly. Who punches themselves out like that at this level?

GS: Well, you know what? Angulo reminded me of Jeff Lacy. He never gave John Beninati and GSP [Gary Shaw Productions] credit for rounding up the right opponents in his career. We all knew who Angulo was. It only takes one Jeff Lacy in your career to kind of sober you up, because I even got caught up in the Lacy hype myself. When Calzaghe beat him from pillar to post, I thought I was having an out of body experience. Seriously. If you notice, Lacy was never the same again. We knew Angulo, you know, everybody made this big thing out of Angulo's chin, but if you look carefully, even in the Joel Julio fight, Julio stung him in the middle of the ring. You see his legs go wobbly, so we knew what we had in Angulo. You know, they kept talking about him being a devastating puncher. Well, if you have the right opponents, you look like a devastating puncher. We always believed that Angulo was not a devastating puncher, but could put a lot of punches together and he knew how to finish someone when he had them hurt.

BT: Do you think maybe that [knowing how to finish someone] may have worked against him in the Kirkland fight? It seemed like he thought Kirkland was more hurt than he actually was and that kind of prompted him to jump in and blow his whole load.

GS: Yeah, but, you know what? No professional fighter at that level should shoot an entire load in one round to where you're done for the rest of the fight. You know, that's not true. Pacquiao throws a lot of punches, a lot, and he's not done. There are other fighters that are more conservative in their punches, but to me, it's all about good karma. He had good people around him that loved him, like myself, like Ceasar Hernandez, like [Clemente] Medina, the trainer, like Nacho De La Hoya, these are the people that were around him all the time. He kicked everyone to the curb. He can say whatever he wants about me; he's not said anything about everybody else he kicked to the curb.

BT: What exactly happened with all of that?

GS: Angulo has lied throughout this whole thing. I can't tell you, but I can tell you the people that know how many times, after I offered him the $750,000, that I tried to call him to do other things. He would not answer the phone, he would not take a call from me. Now that's fact. Seymour, who works for me, who speaks spanish, could tell you that. Medina, who was the trainer, could tell you that. Nacho De La Hoya could tell you that. Ceasar Hernandez, who drove him cross country and stayed by his side and took Perro to his family, could tell you that. Tonya, who worked for him or was a girlfriend or whatever she was, would tell you that. It's not that I didn't try to reach him or I made one offer and never tried to contact him again. He's an absolute liar; he's a pathological liar. I must have put in 20 or 30 calls to him without one response, so to me, good karma won out in the end, not only for me, not only for GSP and all the people, including my wife, who opened up her home to him and bought him jewelry, not only to them, but it was a victory for Ceasar, for Nacho, for Clemente Medina, who I know felt hurt. You never hear Clemente complain. I can't tell you how many times we tried to get Clemente paid and Angulo didn't want to pay him, or paid him less than he should've gotten. What about all those things? Truthfully, Angulo was just not a good person and good karma beat him.

BT: Do you think it was a matter of people getting into his ear and him taking the wrong advice?

GS: Well, look, I wasn't there. I've always believed this, if you tell the truth, you can tell the same story a thousand times and nothing will change. If you don't tell the truth, then the story keeps changing. The truth is I was offered $900,000 by DiBella to fight Sergio Martinez. I told him I would get right back to him; we were on a timeframe. I then immediately called the WBC and wanted to know that if I moved Angulo up to 160, then I would stay as the #1 mandatory [at 154]. They gave me their word. I then called HBO and made sure that if Angulo lost moving up, they would absolutely bring him back. They said yes, so to me, that was a tremendous deal. I was getting less than 20%, plus I had to pay to fly him and the team to wherever we're going. Prior to that fight, the Sergio Martinez offer, I got him a strength and conidtioning coach, Darryl Hudson. I paid $10,000 out of my pocket, thinking that if he had a strength and conditioning coach, he would be better off. I offered him the $750,000, he didn't even get on the phone. He never got on the phone. He had Tonya tell me he wants $1 million. I said to her, "Tell him there's not $1 million on the table. I can't get him what's not on the table. This is a one-time offer. They're going to go a different way." He refused to get on the phone; never got on the phone. She said to me, "He wants a million or he's not fighting." I told them, "I guess we won't be fighting." That's the last conversation I had with her to Angulo or anybody else. I have told that story a thousand times; I'll tell it another thousand times. I then called Mike Criscio, the manager. I apologized for calling Angulo directly, because I thought he was going to be so happy and excited to fight Sergio Martinez, with everything I did, and get $750,000 to a guy that said he juggles for money in the streets of Mexico. When he turned it down, I called Mike, I told him that I called the fighter directly, I apologized. I said, "In a way, I just wanted the glory myself. I never thought I'd get the response that I got." Mike said, "Give me a shot!" Mike called either once or twice, was exasperated, called me and said, "He's nut. He wants a million dollars. I keep telling him it's not there." That's the last that I ever spoke to Angulo; I didn't speak to Angulo, but I spoke to someone on and off. After that, I must've made 20 or 30 calls to him on his cell phone until his cell phone got changed. I called Nacho to try to reach him, I called Medina to try to reach him, I called Ceasar Hernandez to try to reach him, and they all told me the same thing, "He's not talking to any of us." So anything else you hear is not true. That's true. That can be backed up by Seymour, that can be backed up by people in my office, it can be backed up by Ceasar Hernandez, by Clemente Medina, by Nacho De La Hoya, all these people. Nacho De La Hoya never got a dime, so, I mean, he's got no skin in the game. All these people will tell you the same story. He kicked everybody to the side of the road. These are people that put everything into this kid.

BT: Well, that's what I was getting at. Usually when a fighter is putting a certain number out there like that, it's because someone else is in his ear telling him that there's more money available and he's worth more. You went through a similar situation with Tim Bradley where you put everyting on the table and kind of said, "This is how much is available, this is what I'm getting and this is what you're getting," and yet he still wasn't happy about...

GS: (Cutting in) Well with Bradley, I knew it was Cameron Dunkin. The day Cameron Dunkin came on board, I knew Thompson and I would have problems, and that's what happened. Cameron is a bad guy. You can quote me on that. He and Miller, I believe, had a piece of Angulo. I know Miller had [a piece] for sure. Now they got two guys fighting one another. You know, they knew that they were going to walk off with the winner. That fight was set up for Angulo. It was to sacrifice Kirkland. I think Golden Boy is in shock today, Miller must be in shock today, and Cameron must be in shock today, you know, because the wrong guy won. I mean, if you think Kirkland is what he is, you don't bring him to Mexico to the fight. Now we'll see if HBO goes back there for Angulo. We'll see how fast they're running back for Angulo. I don't believe Angulo will ever be the same. Just like Lacy was never the same, he will never be the same fighter. And you know why? Other fighters that watched it, if they were a bit hesitant in fighting Angulo, will now all want to fight him. There will be no fear. It was like once Tyson was exposed, everybody wanted to fight him. They myth is gone. When the schoolyard bully gets beat up, he's not the bully anymore.

BT: Yeah, Angulo definitely took some punishment in that fight, probably a lot more than he needed, so I can see that having an affect on him.

GS: We protected Angulo. I didn't ever tell anybody that he cried in the bathroom after the Cintron fight. He wasn't this fierce dog; he cried. He got an ol' fashioned ass whoppin' on Saturday.

BT: (Laughing) Damn. I think you're right about Golden Boy though. I'm pretty sure they were hoping to set up a big fight between Angulo and Canelo.

GS: They were sacrificing him [Kirkland]. They had the officials, the WBC, everybody was crowning Angulo. Believe me, they're in fucking shock today, and I don't even know what they paid Angulo, or paid for Angulo; they may have given him a bonus on top of everything. You know, I wasn't privy to that. I just know what my deal is.

BT: I'm sure they're definitely in shock. I think even the judges had the fight way closer than it should have been at the time of the stoppage.

GS: Yeah, one judge had it one round apart from one another. What the? Come on. The world knows what it saw. That's what's wrong with fucking boxing. You know, the judges forget that the world is watching. One round difference? I mean, that was an ol' fashioned ass whoopin'. That's all that was.

BT: (Laughing) Roy [Jones Jr.] called it to a tee. When Angulo punched himself out, Roy pretty much said he was done and there would be no way he could recover after that. He was 100% right.

GS: Roy is a tremendous announcer. I mean, if you go back and listen to everything that he said, he was right on. He said his legs were gone, he was slow, he won't recover. I mean, he even said when Angulo knocked him down in the first round that Kirkland will now come back. You know, and I'll tell you the other thing, besides us lining up the right opponents for him, Clemente Medina never got enough credit. They all talk about Nacho Beristain, you know, I don't know what Nacho's claim to fame is other than Juan Manuel, who's going to get a real ass whoopin' from Pacquiao.

BT: Ooooooh, you think?

GS: Yes. Yep, I sure do. I think he's going to get an ass whoopin'. You can quote me on that. It's going to be an ol' fashioned ass whoopin' by Manny. They all talk about Nacho, Nacho, but Clemente Medina is a hell of a trainer, and for sure, he did a lot better with Angulo than Nacho.

BT: It was pretty obvious to me that Angulo wasn't expecting this fight to go too long, like somebody told him that as soon as you touch this kid on the chin, he ain't recovering. It's been a while since I've seen someone at this level just punch themselves out like that.

GS: Well, you gotta also give credit to Kirkland because he also boxed him, and we know one thing about Angulo and we know one thing about Jeff Lacy, they could not fight boxers. They needed opponents that would stay in front of them, and I think that's what they thought Kirkland would do and I think they thought that, especially after he got knocked down in the first after 30 seconds, that, you know, it was over. But I know one thing about Ann Wolfe, she's a hell of a trainer, she's a hell of a task master. I've seen Kirkland get up before when I had him and I have a lot of respect for him, and you know what? James Kirkland, even though he left me because of Cameron Dunkin, he never said a word about me in a negative way, ever. You can look at every James Kirkland quote, there was never anything about Gary Shaw. Never! I have a lot of respect for him. I saw him in a hotel about 2 1/2 years ago before he got incarcerated, he came over and hugged me. That's the truth. And I hugged him. A lot of respect for him. But not Perro, who's badmouthing me on the conference call about his promoter, his promoter, all that bullshit.

BT: If either one of them were still with you, after seeing a performance like that, would you say they were ready for a Sergio Martinez at this stage of their career.

GS: I think a promoter's job is to do the best job he can for the fighter that he represents. I think that's it in a nutshell, so I thought $750,000, remain at number one, and a guarantee to come back on HBO was worth the risk. Kirkland can punch, so if he hits Sergio Martinez on the button, Sergio's in trouble. Would I fight Sergio Martinez with Kirkland for $750,000, number one, and a comeback fight on HBO? Yes! 100%! Would I do that with Angulo now after the ass whoopin' he got? No! He's gotta re-up everything. He's gotta come back somehow. Would I do it with Kirkland? Yes, you bet! Look, I did it with Sergio Dzinziruk. He's never been knocked down in his life, you know? Martinez knocked him down two or three times. It was interesting.

BT: I'm sure Angulo's team is going to look at the tape and figure the only reason why the lost was simply because he made the mistake of punching himself out. In a lot of ways, there's some truth to that I suppose, so I'm sure Golden Boy will probably look to start rebuilding him pretty quickly, like they did with Ortiz after the Maidana fight.

GS: I would put Dzinziruk in with him in less than a heartbeat, because he's never going to beat a boxer. Period. They now know that they can push him back. One thing Kirkland learned from the first two seconds of that fight was that he could back Angulo up. Angulo never stalked him. He stalked Angulo. They can say anything that they want, that he punched himself out, but how's he going to beat a [Erislandy] Lara? How's he going to beat the cream of the crop? And HBO, this year, under the new regime, they're not going to put on Angulo against a piece of shit. If they build Angulo back, they better be looking for some other, you know, Univision or one of those stations. He's not getting built back on American TV. I end the interview the same way I started, good Karma wins out. Maybe not right way, but at the end of the day, good karma wins out.

BT: Before I let you go, Kimbo recently got himself a nice knockout victory. Give me your thoughts on his future plans.

GS: I'm going to move him. Hopefully we're going to fight December, January, and February. By that time, he'll have 5 fights under his belt, you know, and then maybe we give James Toney a shot if he wants his shot, or [Ray] Mercer, or maybe some of the other heavyweights, we'll see, but I want to get two or three more fights under Kimbo's belt. I also want to fight him in Japan and I want to fight him in Australia. We're going to take him overseas as well.

BT: What about Chad? What's the latest and greatest with that situation?

GS: December 13th we have a hearing in California, so I can't comment until after that.

BT: Very cool. Well, I won't keep you Gary.

GS: Ben, I appreciate the interview and I appreciate you telling the truth. I respect you and I really appreciate it.



[ Follow Ben Thompson on Twitter @fighthype ]

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