They may find Jimmy Hoffa before America finds another great heavyweight. It’s almost redundant to call the search futile. Yet it continues Saturday, mostly because Seth Mitchell and Johnathon Banks are good guys. They respect each other, their craft and their audience.
Thank you, gentlemen, for a rematch that serves as a refuge from a main event preceded by the indulgent trash talk that Adrien Broner has spewed without shame or end in the build-up to his welterweight debut against Paulie Malignaggi at Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
The temptation is to boycott Broner. Not because he figures to win. His talent speaks for itself. It’s just all the speaking Broner promises to do after the victory. Anyway, I’ll watch him fight, but skip Showtime’s post-fight interview.
“To each his own,’’ said Mitchell, a former Michigan State linebacker who picked up some of dipolomacy’s finer points while majoring in football and criminal justice. “I’m big a fan of both of them. Adrien Broner and me have a personal relationship. I know Paul Malignaggi but not on a personal relationship level. Both of them are helluva fighters. I can’t speak on how they feel about their fight. That’s just what they do. To each his own. But I know I’m looking forward to a good fight.’’
Banks agreed when asked about rhetoric that has taken on a garbage-like tone in pre-fight proceedings for Broner-Malignaggi.
“Well, it’s almost the same thing that Mitchell said: To each his own,’’ said Banks, who inherited some of the calm-in-the storm poise from his late teacher, trainer and father-figure, Emanuel Steward. “This is their personalities, and I think no matter what, when you have two fighters, you must show their personalities. These guys’ fans, they’re talkers. It’s what they do. It’s their personalities. So, that’s what they’re doing.’’
Mitchell and Banks agree on a lot. It’s as if they understand instinctively that they’re partners in a business that dictates they fight each other. It’s not personal. It’s just punches.
Banks displayed superior instinct for those punches in a surprising second-round stoppage of Mitchell last June. It was a sign, perhaps, of what will happen again Saturday in a sequel postponed in February because Banks fractured a thumb in training. Banks grew up in boxing at Detroit’s Kronk Gym. He moves around the ring like its home. Mitchell is a newcomer. If not for a knee injury at Michigan State, he might be an NFL linebacker today.
But their respective personalities create a compelling rematch. Mitchell understands that he’s still a student. In Banks, he lost to a fighter who also learned the trainer’s trade from one of history’s all-timers in Steward. Banks, who succeeded Steward as Wladimir Klitschko’s trainer, is a teacher.
Their rematch is about how much the student learned in a loss to the teacher.
“I just have to go out there and show you what I’ve learned from that fight, what Johnathon Banks has taught me from that fight,’’ Mitchell said.
Banks, who said he has two different and distinct roles, says he won’t be working as the teacher in the rematch.
“I wear two different hats,’’ Banks said “I wear a training hat and a fighter’s hat. When it’s time for me to prepare for my fight, the training hat goes off and the fighter hat comes on. So, the two don’t connect with one another.’’
They don’t insult anyone either, which on Saturday night’s card stands as pretty good lesson for everyone.
