BEVERLY HILLS ? Basically, he was tired of the road games.
For his first title, Tim Bradley met Junior Witter, who is from England. The fight was in Nottingham. That was OK, Bradley thought, since Witter was the champ.
Despite being warned about “Witt-ah the hitt-ah,” as Bradley laughingly recalls, he won.
But for his second defense of that WBC light-welterweight title, Bradley faced Kendall Holt.
Holt is from Paterson, N.J. The fight was in Montreal.
“What am I doing in Canada?” he wondered. He won anyway.
The kicker was last December.
Devon Alexander had gotten Bradley’s WBC belt, although Bradley still was unbeaten. Now they would settle things.
Alexander is from St. Louis, Bradley from Palm Springs. So, naturally, they met in Pontiac, Mich., in an 80,000-seat shell called the Silverdome.
Bradley bundled up in towels to enter the shivering ring. He won, but not happily.
“I thought the fight was gonna be in Joe Louis Arena in downtown Detroit,” Bradley said. “Then we went out to Pontiac and I saw this big place and I said, wow, how are we going to sell this out?”
They weren’t, of course. The crowd estimate was 6,000.
“They put it in a decrepit barn,” Bob Arum said. “That’s what I mean when I say there aren’t many real promoters. Can you believe Tim Bradley has never fought in Las Vegas, Los Angeles or New York? That’s crazy.”
So Bradley waited for his contract with Gary Shaw Promotions to expire on June 30, and then he signed a three-year deal, with options, with Arum’s Top Rank.
