Boxing’s most admirable

By Bart Barry

The best part of this job is access. A regular chance to converse with heroes about what makes them different. Or the same. Somewhere in that intersection -- how normal prizefighters consider themselves; how different the rest of us think they are -- is a comment on the human condition.

Making comments, of course, is the job. Except when you are with a prizefighter. Then, listening is much more important because writers who tell fighters things worry about what they’re going to say more than listen to what is said. Just like in life.

But there are those occasions when a writer is justified in saying something to a fighter. That’s what this is about.

Early last week I got a press release from Desert Diamond Casino. It gave a general summary of the upcoming week’s activities and included an unexpected treat. Israel Vazquez would be in Tucson as part of Golden Boy Promotions’ fight week program.

Friday came and so did the drive to Tucson. Sonora Desert doesn’t change much over the 100-mile stretch between Phoenix and Desert Diamond, and there was plenty of time for reflection.

That returned me to a significantly colder place: Home Depot Center in March. Southern California is not the Arctic, but in March it was not warm. After the best fight we may see for 10 years, Vazquez-Marquez III, the media assembled in a conference room beside the tennis stadium -- as much for its warmth as what the participants might say.

Some of us needed a quote for our ringside reports, others material for a column. What we got was Team Marquez storming the room. Gary Shaw’s permascowl and Jaime Quintana’s ugly petulance. Rafael Marquez’s dwindled sportsmanship could be forgiven -- he’d taken hundreds of blows, after all. But his promoter and manager were a different story.

That night Israel Vazquez, when he was allowed to speak, set a new standard of decency.

As I drove towards Tucson four months later, I looked forward to measuring Vazquez. I wanted to know if he was as noble, alone, as he looked by contrast in March.

I arrived and took my seat at ringside. From Arizona to California to Nevada to Texas, there’s not a better media section than at Desert Diamond. The cast of characters is always the same -- a bunch of young, witty scribes. A few of them had talked to Vazquez at Thursday’s weigh-in. I was curious what they thought of him.

“You’re going to like him,” one volunteered. “Ask him a question, and he talks and talks,” another answered.

In the night’s co-main event Jhonny Gonzalez needed less than a round to go through Leivi Brea. Since Gonzalez and Vazquez made the best fight any of us actually saw in 2006, and since Gonzalez has often said he wants a rematch, I shuffled back towards the dressing rooms with Vazquez on my mind.

He was on Gonzalez’s mind too.

“Vazquez talks about every Mexican but me,” Gonzalez said. “Arce, Marquez, others. But my name never comes out of his mouth.”

It was something to ask Vazquez about, mostly to see his reaction. He had, we shouldn’t forget, risen from the blue mat twice and battered Gonzalez into a 10th round submission. Was he really ducking him now?

After David “The Destroyer” Lopez worked his way to a fifth-round knockout of overmatched Billy Lyell in Friday’s main event, there was plenty of downtime. Nick Prevenas, who writes for Green Valley News and Sun and might soon be Arizona boxing’s best newspaper writer, helpfully calculated there could be as many as 16 rounds left on the card.

Back to the media room. This time with Vazquez. After he answered Gonzalez’s challenge by saying he’d like to give every fighter a chance but it wasn’t his decision -- it was up to promoters Golden Boy and Sycuan, and manager Frank Espinoza -- Vazquez addressed something else that had happened in the Desert Diamond media room.

A year ago Freddie Roach, who trained Vazquez for his first fight with Marquez, stood in the same room and said he was afraid for Vazquez. He said Vazquez was beginning to slur his words and get hit way too much. Though he wished Vazquez all the best, he was glad not to be a part of Vazquez-Marquez II.

“I think it depends on the perspective a person has,” Vazquez said about Roach’s less-than-prophetic appraisal. “It is easy to see someone who cannot do it anymore, if that is what you are looking for. Maybe I am not 100%, but I feel good.”

Then Vazquez said something unusual.

“Let me ask you,” he said. “How do you think I look?”

Much better than the last time. The marks over his eyes are now dusty pink, not lipstick red. The rest of his face appears taut. He has a standard-issue nose. And in a pair of designer glasses and button-down shirt, he looks more like a lawyer at Starbucks than a legendary prizefighter.

That’s what he might be, by the way. When you take Vazquez-Gonzalez, add Vazquez-Marquez I and II together, and then consider Vazquez-Marquez III, there’s a good chance Israel Vazquez was in the best fight of 2006, 2007 and 2008. Legendary stuff.

Which brings me to what I was in Tucson to tell him: As much of a privilege as it was to watch his last four fights, the greater privilege was to watch him in that March press conference. No matter how his rightful spotlight was clumsily seized by Team Marquez’s senseless protest, Vazquez remained a gentleman. He was soft-spoken, humble and gracious in victory. He gave Marquez far more credit than Marquez gave him. It was an honor to be in his presence.

So you asked how I think you look, Israel? Like the most admirable person in boxing -- a sport full of admirable people.