A ROLL-CALL of champions and future Hall of Famers followed in the ensuing years: Michael Moorer, Tapia, Mike Tyson, Oscar De La Hoya, Bernard Hopkins, Michael Katsidis, Manny Pacquiao and his ?most talented?, James Toney. Is he a father-figure, brother, friend, instructor or guide?
?Probably a little bit of everything,? he says. ?Babysitter sometimes, psychiatrist… I learnt a lesson from Virgil [Hill] because I got too close and our relationship was too friendly. I don?t make that mistake anymore because when I?d tell him to do something he?d laugh it off and I?d say ?Hey, I?m serious? and it affected our relationship.
?So I have a working relationship with my fighters. With Pacquiao it?s more like a father figure because I?ve stepped out of my boundaries a couple of times because he?s asked me for help on situations where he thought people were taking advantage of him.
?Some people don?t like that I did that but I don?t care because I think it was the right thing to do. That was proved because people were taking advantage of him. But I don?t hang out with him. We don?t even have dinner together. We have a great working relationship and that?s the best way.?
?I?ve trained some difficult guys [to work with] like Tyson and Toney but no fighter?s more difficult than Moorer. He?s a talented guy and I just wonder how good he could have been if he liked boxing, because he hates it. He hates training. He?s good at it, but it was very difficult to get through to him.
?You get a guy like him in the dressing room getting ready to fight David Tua and he doesn?t want to warm-up or do anything and he says ?I just want to listen to my music?. You can?t force him to do it. He?s a grown man. I worked that fight but didn?t train him for that fight. Emanuel Steward did. Emanuel was working the [HBO] broadcast so he asked me to work the corner and I said ?No? because I didn?t train him for the fight. I kept saying ?No no no and he said ?Please Freddie, help us?.
?In that fight [Moorer] had no intention of winning. I wrapped his hands. He sat down and listened to his music, went out there as cold as a fish and just stood in the corner and let Tua beat him up.? Just 30 seconds later Tua?s hand was raised. ?To me he?s not a guy who responds to being yelled at and I thought I could get more out of Michael by being his friend and letting him know I?m there for him, but he?s a very hard guy to get inside, a very difficult nut to crack.
?Me and Toney were pretty good friends. I?ve been to his house once. One day I said ?yes? and I went and watched a football game. We became friends after he threw a chair through my wall in the gym and I went after him. He said ?I?ll kill you? and I said, ?when we?re done you?ll know you?ve been in a fight?. I knew I would probably get my ass kicked, but I wasn?t going to back down. And he said ?you crazy white boy? and we?ve been friends pretty much ever since. He liked it that I stood up for myself.
?When James says ?all you other guys have to train and I was born to do this? that?s pretty much true. It?s unbelievable, the talent he?s got, but his discipline and lack of caring about his weight has ruined our relationship because I?m always trying to get him in shape and I say ?you?re making me look bad and you?re starting to get hit more? and he?s fighting heavyweights now.
?The second Sam Peter fight I was really worried about him because he took a lot of shots. He?s slowing down a little bit and I told him, ?James, if you don?t lose the weight you?re going to have to retire? and he told me where to go, so that was that.
?Someday he?ll realise I was just trying to look out for his best interests.
?But the thing is I didn?t make 22 world champions. Those 22 world champions made me and I had guys like De La Hoya and Tyson late in their careers.
?Mike was a great guy to work with and has a great side to him. He does have a dark side, yes, but the thing with Mike is ? don?t feel sorry for him ? he?s not dumb. He was very hard to get to mentally and I did get to him in the dressing room before one of our fights and he went and knocked this guy out with a combination we had just worked on. He was so happy. Mike has been hurt [psychologically] so many times in life that he doesn?t trust anyone and I don?t blame him. But a lot of that is his own fault and he knows it.
?When we trained I made him throw up more than I made anyone in my life. I pushed him so hard on the mitts that he threw up and pulled his gloves off and said ?I?m done?. I said ?you ain?t done, get back in here?. I?ve got pictures of me and him working in bare fists and I made him do three more rounds.
?The next day we were working the mitts and he caught me a right hook on the chin. I said Mike, ?I hope that wasn?t on purpose [because of yesterday]?, he says it wasn?t ?it was an accident, are you okay?? He hurt me pretty bad, but I didn?t go down!?
Even though Freddie gets to work on the biggest stages, the adrenaline surge from walking to the ring with a fighter doesn?t match that of being the boxer. It?s something he accepts he will never come close to duplicating.
?Being a fighter, I wish I could have been a world champion. I thought I could have been at one time in my life. I came up a little short and I?m a little disappointed. But I don?t dwell on it. I?m happy training fighters but there?s still that desire to be a world champion and it will never leave me. But it?s too late.?
That was compounded in 1992 when, out running with Hill, he had a fall that triggered the early onset of Parkinson?s.
?I started having tremors when I twisted my leg running and they say the trauma of me breaking my ankle set off a lot of things. When I came out of the cast I had a drop foot. I couldn?t straighten my heel, so I had a bit of a limp and tremors and they say it?s boxing-related. They can assume it but they can?t prove it.
?When I was diagnosed they put me on medication that helps me somewhat and I go to my neurologist every three months and they make sure I?m okay and stable. Since I?ve had Parkinson?s, I?m probably better now than I was then because I can deal with it a little better. I used to get mad at people looking at me limping or shaking and I would say ?what are you looking at?? I was mad because I didn?t want to have this.
?But it?s part of life now. I take my medication three times a day and when I start shaking I know it?s time to take them.
?One doctor says my damage is done. Another says it?s getting worse. Another says it?s a great to have a great outlook but you are going to get worse, it?s a progressive disease. So I?m going to work my ass off until I can?t.?
?People say ?Why do you still train fighters, you?re a millionaire?? I say ?I?m not really a millionaire because the IRS [US tax man] is going to prevent that all the time?, but the thing is I hope I?m functional enough to do it.
?If I can?t do the job, I won?t do it. I?m sane enough to know when it?s going to be time. I?m not going to be hanging on too long. I?m not going to be a charity case or anything like that. I think it?s the last job of my life.?
He believes his Parkinson?s is related to fighting. ?I was a give-and-take kind of guy ? trauma ? but my dad had Alzheimer?s and traces of Parkinson?s and his father had traces of Parkinson?s before he died. My dad died at 61, his dad died at 62, so maybe 60… I hope to live a little longer than that. We?ll see. That?s why I?ve got to get everything before then.
?I?ve done everything in life I wanted to do except have a wife and a child, but it?s really hard to do that when I have 14 pros and they?re all my kids. People say, ?why don?t you have kids?? and they really don?t know.
?The marriage part I don?t mind. It?s just the relationship, being one-on-one. I don?t know if I believe in marriage because if I have a commitment to somebody I have a commitment to them. I?m a pretty disciplined like that.?
He thinks he might have met ?the one?, in the Philippines, where he is a superstar for his work with national icon Pacquiao.
?I?ve thought about it [moving out there]. Boxing?s really big there. They treat me so well that when I come home it?s hard because I?m the third most popular person there. Pacquiao is No. 1, the President is No. 2, Freddie Roach is No. 3. When you walk across the street and the bus stops, 30 people get off to get your picture and your autograph in the middle of the street. That?s how crazy it is. One of my friends came with me and said if he hadn?t seen it he wouldn?t have believed it.
?On Sundays there, my day off, I go to the salon and get a back scrub, pedicure, foot scrub. It all comes to $6. I tip more than the bill. I once spent two-and-a-half hours signing pictures at the mall on a Sunday.?
Back in LA, in his time-off, he likes going to the cinema. He enjoys kids? films ? like The Incredibles ? (his favourite is the baseball classic The Natural). And when former pro Shane Langford turns on the bell at 8am to indicate the Wild Card orphanage for fighters from around the world is open for business, the 5ft 5in bespectacled Roach raises from his slumber next door and goes to work.
Business is booming with more than 150 boxers, MMA fighters and average Joes going through the door each day.
When Pacquiao or another superstar is in town that figure can be trebled or more. ?I like living next to the gym,? says the man towards whom it?s hard not to feel some affection. He has a 37in plasma TV (?Oscar has a 110in plasma?), subscribes to HBO and Showtime and enjoys Law and Order but luxuries are few and far between.
?I don?t like living in big places, because I don?t like big empty space and like to know where everything is and like everything clean. I?m a little crazy because everything has to have its place. I?m a little eccentric. I?m cleaner than most girls. I vacuum and make the bed. I don?t know where it comes from, but I try to better myself all the time. I try not to talk negatively about anyone, but have difficulty because I watch the Mayweathers and guys like that make me mad.?
Floyd Snr and Roger are often on TV in the US talking badly about Roach and giving him the kind of immature nicknames he confronted as a child. Part of Roger?s feud with Roach stems back to an old sparring session in Vegas. Roach was a brawler in his prime against Roger, who had yet to develop his punch. Freddie says he chased him round the ring for three rounds.
?They asked me the next day if we wanted to spar and I said no because I had done my roadwork in the morning,? says Freddie, smiling. Floyd Snr apparently remains sore that Roach trained De La Hoya against Floyd Jnr after Snr priced himself out of Oscar?s corner.
Roach says he?d like to be like Angelo Dundee. ?You?ve never heard him say a bad word about anybody. It?s a quality I haven?t perfected it but it?s a work in progress.?
Whether his fighter is a star or not, Freddie?s mission is to let his man know that he?s there for them. The same way Futch was for him.
?Eddie taught me a lot of things about boxing and a lot of it?s about the fine-tuning, the little things that make a big difference between a good fighter and a champion. I know what they are and the fighters have confidence in me and I have it in them and I?m on their side 100 per cent. I will die for them. I will.
?If they get in a fight at the weigh-in or something like that, I?m on their side. I?m getting a little too old and small to fight these big guys nowadays, but I just let my fighters know I?m with them every step of the fight.
