“I’m overly excited about this,” Lacy said, the excitement speeding up his speech. “My feelings for Dec. 11, I guarantee you when I look out into that audience when that fight is over with, a lot of people are going to be in total shock because of where I’ve been and where they’re used to seeing me at, what I’ve done the last couple of times in the ring and what I’m doing now. It’s going to be night and day. It’s a shock to me and I’m walking around in my own body.”
Jeff Lacy is confident fans will be in awe of his performance Saturday night against Dhafir Smith.
That was the unfortunate prefight quotation and the “cutline” under hometown hero Lacy’s photo on TBO, Tampa Bay Online.
And then the most overrated fighter of his generation went into a chilly, outdoor ring at a Tampa nightclub and LOST a wide, unanimous decision to someone named Dhafir Smith, a Philadelphian with a pro record that looks like the DOB on somebody’s driver’s license.
24-19-7, that was Smith’s record before he won something called the UBO title, which must include a papier-mache belt with an rubber band buckle, by decisioning Lacy over 12 rounds.
So now Smith is 25-19-7 (a measly four KOs) and Lacy, falling to 25-4, has a career which is pretty much toast.
The judges’ scores were 118-110, 117-111 and what had to be a generous (to Lacy) 116-112.
Lacy has lost three of his last four bouts and what’s the point of continuing unless he wants to take a one way trip to Palookaville, to become a ham and egg opponent?
I don’t blame Lacy for his fizzled career.
It was Showtime and Big Gary Shaw who hyped him as a New Mike Tyson. They weren’t being malicious but, sometimes in boxing, the parade starts before it is warranted.
When was Lacy ruined?
It’s obvious he was never the same after taking a merciless 12 round whipping from Super Joe Calzaghe in Manchester in March, 2006.
I saw first row ringside with Mikkel Kessler and Mogens Palle and we were astonished that neither Shaw nor Lacy’s corner ever halted the beating.
“Why do they call him, Left Hook,” Palle said, “when he has no hook?”
Today, as a reader named “Alvin Meynard Mendoza Arceo” put it, “Left Hook has become a leftover.”
“I think Lacy got ruined,” agent Johnny Bos said Sunday, “because they should’ve stopped that fight after six rounds.”
Lacy was never what they made him out to be but don’t blame him. He wasn’t the one hyping himself although he might’ve believed the false sales pitch.
They made a monster out of a talented but mechanical and inflexible fighter and he could never live up to the billing.
I hope he quits the ring because Palookaville is not a lot of fun.
