Las Vegas, NV- Mr. Admitted Briber (money launderer, etc) himself, AKA Bob Arum of Top Rank, a major boxing promotional company based here in Las Vegas, blamed boxing’s decline and the UFC’s rise on none other than HBO’s Larry Merchant! “Nobody wants to hear Larry Merchant pontificate.” Having tried his best to get Merchant fired years ago, Arum is an, well you know, and if he wants to blame somebody for boxing’s decline, Bob should look at that catcher’s mitt of a mug of his in the mirror.
MOST OF THE PROMOTERS TO BLAME
One-side fights, fighters getting screwed not once, but time and again on television, Bob Arum, Don King, and the others that have made millions running the sport into the ground, you all just sat back and shut the puck up solely because your bread was buttered.
REMEMBER WHEN THEY REALLY MADE FIGHTS?
Although Arum has always been one to stack major undercards with piles of boxing dung like ”Butterbean” Esch and his compatriots. But looking back at the June 30, 1994 edition of “Flash” magazine, the late Jack Welsh wrote a story about a September 17th card with Julio Cesar Chavez (ducking Frankie Randall after two fights/losses) was to face Juan Coggi, Felix Trinidad-“Yory Boy” Campas, Gerald McClellan-Segundo Mercado, Terry Norris-Luis Santana, Gianfranoc Rossi vs. Vincent Pettway, and Ricardo Lopez taking on another Thai jockey with a handful of fights.
ALMOST UNBEATABLE SHOW THE NORM “THEN”
In the two and half months leading up to the September 1994 show, things changed a bit. The final lineup went like this: Julio Cesar Chavez TKO 8 Meldrick Taylor II, Vincent Pettway beat Gianfranco Rosi, Frankie Randall UD 10 Juan Coggi, Felix Trinidad TKO 4 “Yory Boy” Campas, Gabe Ruelas UD 12 Jesse James Leija, and Giovanni Parisi bested Freddie Pendleton in a dime. Seeing the card on video a week later, due to the fact I was in Macau working with the infamous genius, Mr. Harold Smith, it was a great card.
EVEN GOLDEN BOY GUILTY A BIT!
Nobody wants to put together these “super” shows anymore. Some say it is because King’s stable doesn’t pack the superstar punch it did in the 90’s. But Arum has had a plethora of fighters, and he stuck with the one big fight on PPV concept, and it has made him nearly a billionaire. Now Golden Boy Promotions, they need to use the old King methodology, and put on super cards, not just a super fight.
BACK TO ARUM BLAMING HBO GODFATHER
With Federal probes, admitting to solicitation of, and then following through in bribing then IBF President Bob Lee. After Arum got wind of Lee shaking down George Foreman, this in addition to him giving bagman Stan Hoffman, a boxing manager, the job of getting Lee $150,000 that was “washed” in Europe, all to rate Axel Shultz, a guy Foreman that he could lick.
ARUM IS AN ADMITTED FELON!
Most of you have seen the document that Arum penned for the US Justice Dept. back in the late 1990’s, he details the bribing of Lee, who should soon be getting out of jail, if he hasn’t already. Arum was hoping that the FBI would grab Lee and get him to rollover and cough up Don King. Instead, Lee wouldn’t squeal on anybody, not King (Fuzzy Wuzzy) or Cedric Kushner (The Fatman), the aliases utilized by the late Doug Beavers and Lee, while they carved up money from the pair.
ONLY AN IDIOT WOULD BLAME MERCHANT
Only Bob Arum, the man who is on record saying, “yesterday I was lying, but today I’m telling the truth,” would have the friggen chutzpah to blame a TV commentator for his throwing s*it in the swimming pool, when all the while it was the greed and control of a few that have this sport in such a perilous position, UFC or not!
