Tarver's Troubles

By Patrick Kehoe: Once upon a time, the boxing world stood at the feet of Antonio Tarver. The bald one from Florida had vanquished his career nemesis, Roy Jones Jr., knocking him out inside of two rounds in May of 2004, to prove the sonic messaging of is words of greatness were really justified. Before the knockout of Jones in their rematch, Tarver was known as a mere talker, a guy looking for audience approval.

The mature phase of his career had shown only fleeting signs of singularity and never utter dominance. Journalists would scrum Tarver or listen in on conference calls and basically yawn during his sermons of self-grandeur. Was he well spoken and occasionally funny, undeniably. But where were the facts - the eye popping wins - to support such a mountain of rhetoric? One would have thought a fighter sporting the tag "Magic Man" would have delivered on his promises of brilliance well before the age of thirty-five.

Then again he did admit he'd relied on his "natural ability and one punch hitting power," as he frankly described it, never really establishing a penchant for training with professional dedication. Tarver was flash and dash; he loved to live it up and look the part. While Roy Jones trained and reigned, Tarver took the pedestrian route to the top, sometimes rationalizing life, at times crying the blues, always frustrated and yet he wasn't exactly fighting like a man who had a date with a wondrous destiny.

Then five months shy of his thirtieth birthday came thee reality check of his career, when he faced off with undefeated Eric Harding, June, 2000. Tarver's fitness let him down and Harding basically man handled Tarver down the stretch to win comfortably over twelve rounds, having dropped Tarver in the eleventh. At what was the fight to get to Roy Jones and the chance at the title, he'd lost, allowing himself in the process to be out hustled and out worked. Undeniably, the only recourse was to make a decision. Just how much did Tarver want the boxer's life? If he couldn't put in the work to get to the top of the division, what was he doing talking about himself as a future hall of famer and pound for pound king of the ring in waiting? For an instant of self-revelation, Tarver sounded silly to Tarver; and yet the core belief in his ability never waned.

We can't say Antonio Tarver became Mr. Fitness over night. He did however hire a fitness coach, in 2000, also attending to his nutritional issues. You see, just being Antonio Tarver was an expense proposition, the cars, the suits, being the man about town. Time was forcing itself as a framing reality upon the possibilities remaining for his career, if he was ever to get to the summit of Roy Jones. After wins over Reggie Johnson, a rematch stoppage of Harding and a tough win over Montell Griffin, the final attack plan came via the brilliant Charles Muniz, who counseled Tarver to publicly challenge Jones at every opportunity. Jones finally relented, frustrated at what he saw as Tarver's PR grandstanding. Tarver made the most of his assets and gave Roy Jones the most brutaly contested fight of his career, to that time, in November, 2003.

The rematch, anticipated by the very nature of the first fight, was demanded by boxing fans. HBO were thrilled that a rival to Jones' legend had finally emerged. Team Tarver, with trainer Buddy McGirt fine tuning the Tarver attack routes at camp, in Viro Beach, Florida, were off the charts confident going into the May 15, 2004 rematch set for the Mandalay Bay Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. Camouflage military gear had replaced Tarver's executive suit look, during the week before the fight. He said he was ready to go to war to win the fight and take down the "myth of Roy Jones."

All boxing fans remember the punishing left that felled Jones in the second round, setting the boxing world a buzz. That punch made Tarver a champion, vindicating his most egregious boasts, setting him up as a celebrity boxing figure and new HBO darling. Muniz wisely booked Tarver on every television show he could, having Tarver do a myriad of interviews and charity guest spots. It was all about getting the hot property out there, visible, electrified, for the mass cultural media driven public to absorb as a self styled brand name athletic presence. Muniz wanted Tarver imprinted on the collective retinal gaze of North Americans. All Tarver had to do was manage himself, his weight and resign himself to something like financial discipline on the heels of his bankruptcy. After leveling Jones, money would not be a problem for the hot ticket item Tarver, surely?

Coming off the Jones knockout - in boxing terms - the sky was literally the limit for Team Tarver. And no one understood that fact better than Tarver's advisor Muniz. Muniz, a New Yorker turned Floridian, considered the then 35plus Tarver's career in terms of 5 fights. That was the outside number of fights he felt Tarver, given his age, style and career momentum, could reasonably expect or plan on maximizing his fully realized financial potential. And the numbers were astounding. Even without a step up to fight Mike Tyson, a fight considered in the industry as a career cash out gold mine, Muniz was hearing from promoters fights which would have garnered Tarver in the neighborhood of 12 to 15 million. That was the ballpark. Fortuitously for Team Tarver, at that time, Don King was in his initial phases of shopping his various heavyweight title belts occupied by Chris Byrd, newly minted Lamon Brewster, as well as John Ruiz.

King lamented to Team Tarver he had three heavyweights he was losing money with and they weren't the personalities likely to set up showdowns with Vitali Klitschko, thought to be the omnipresent HBO money figure of the post-Lennox Lewis era. The fight with Jones had netted Tarver $600,000 more than Roy Jones and his Square Ring wanted to pay Tarver, not to mention the championship. When Tarver decided not to work with King he passed on the option to fight at heavyweight or what amounted to a contracted catch weight or even taking King up on an 8.2 million dollar purse bid offer to stage the Glen Johnson fight on the allowance that Tarver would grant King a one fight option.

Instead, Tarver moved back to promotional relations with Joe DeGuardia, who was working on a deal with Glen Johnson's promoter Joe Goossen for a Tarver-Glen Johnson showdown. Tarver had a history with DeGuardia and felt comfortable with the New York based promoter and signed on for two years. King was itching to offer up Australian Paul Briggs on a purse bid - a very winnable fight for Tarver - which was going to net Tarver a cool 2.1 million. And Tarver declined, as he had on the opportunity to fight one of King's merry men at heavyweight for twice that money virtually at his beck and call. In all, Tarver passed up close to 10 million dollars in winnable fights just to stay at light-heavy, this despite his post Jones victory stated goal of wanting a heavyweight title. Some believed Tarver was intent on fighting Tyson sooner rather than later and with King and Tyson effectively cut off from one another he sought to be a free agent entity in the mold of Bernard Hopkins or Roy Jones.

Even King was cautioning Tarver against taking the Glen Johnson fight in California. To all tales of caution, it seems Tarver never blinked. Such was Tarver's confidence that the veteran Glen "The Road Warrior" Johnson was no threat to this omnipotence at light-heavyweight. Muniz, who had left Team Tarver, had lobbied to get Tarver an immediate rematch with Jones as a set up for a Johnson fight, both supported by HBO, but with a deal with King for a larger end and promotion controls. Fighting with a one fight deal for purse bids with King would have given Tarver maximum opportunities to pick marketable fight options either at heavyweight or light-heavy, after which Team Tarver could have done a free agent deal with Shelly Finkel for a Tyson fight.

Glen Johnson's promoter Dan Goossen not only got the Tarver-Johnson fight in California - Goossen's home turf - it was astutely maneuvered for a mere 300,000 add on, subject to Tarver agreeing on a site fee in California. Tarver suddenly was the one on the road, having only eight weeks to melt down from 215 to 175 for the fight. Word was Tarver had simply not done enough maintenance training to enter camp so as to really get the most out of the first two weeks of training. All the signs were ominous for those who looked at the situation objectively. Boxing insiders were stunned that DeGuardia had made the deal to defend in Los Angeles at all, effectively seeding promotional influence to the challenger. A move that Muniz certainly would never have allowed to develop, had he still been connected with Team Tarver heading into a fight with Glen Johnson.

And that's only a sketchy over view of the millions Tarver didn't make. Since his split decision loss to Glen Johnson, Tarver's career has certainly cooled off. But boxing is a strange game of fortunes and fate. So while he may have let countless millions go bye the way, Saturday night he's back in the ring with Glen Johnson. And the winner is expected to face Bernard Hopkins in the fall, if B-Hop can stop Jermain Taylor's ascendancy at middleweight. Sounds almost too good to be true, doesn't it?

Then again, perhaps these are all only dominos, so many talking points to leverage the mind and make us think in aggrandizing terms of reference. After all you have to sell a hypothetical future, if you are a promoter to stave off the competition, if you are a cable entity to create viewing hunger and certainly if you are the fighter. All great fighters must keep pristine the image of their most glorious selves - arms raised in victory against incredible foes despite daunting odds - the focus of their imaginings.

And Tarver is a guy who likes to dream big dreams and try to make them into the kind of realities that almost no one could have believed possible for him. No doubt, he's been telling himself just how amazing it's all going to be, after, he gets his payback against Glen Johnson. He figures there's still time to make some decent money. One massive shot or a sustained exhibition of boxing and he'll be the man once again.

That's why they call that square a ring isn't it? You can come full circle in an instant of inspiration. Mostly, all you have to do is believe. And that's always been Tarver's game, believing, despite everything.

Contributing Editor Patrick Kehoe may be reached at pkehoe@telus.net