The Ariel Helwani Show - Inside Boxing | CompuBox creator Bob Canobbio (Dan’s dad) on 45+ years in boxing

Episode Date: June 19, 2026

We open the show with Dan and Bob Canobbio discussing the story of how CompuBox was created in 1985 - by chance, luck, good timing and a very innovative executive at HBO named Ross Greenburg (04:34). The father-son duo talk about big fights Bob attended ringside, including Ray Mancini vs. Livingstone Bramble, Marvin Hagler vs. Ray Leonard, the rise and fall of Mike Tyson, and the modern eras of Oscar De La Hoya, Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao (17:53). Finally, Bob and Dan touch on some personal stories from their lives in boxing and how the sport has molded them as people (30:48). Happy Father’s Day everyone!

Hey, everyone, welcome in to another episode of Inside Boxing. We're powered by ppv.com, an association with Yahoo Sports, and on Crown. That is not Chris Algerie. This is a very special episode. It is Father's Day weekend, and I thought, who better to have on the episode than my dad, Bob Kenobi, the creator of CompuBox, 41 years of CompuBox, 45 plus years in the sport of boxing. We've done a few of these interviews in the... the past. We usually do them around Father's Day, but I'm very grateful to say that our audience

has gotten bigger over the years, and I want everyone to hear these stories, because this is a guy that has quite literally seen every punch and thrown, a punch thrown and landed since 1985. That is not a crazy thing to say. Without further ado, let's bring in the man, Bob Canobio. I'm going to call you Bob on this episode, because I think that is a little strange, but how are you, Bob? Very good, Daniel. I'll call you Daniel. Was that okay? That's fine. All good.

Maybe I'll do a mixture of Bob and Dad, but this is really cool. I've done a few of these in the past. I listened to the last one we did, which was like, I think, 2021. We're going to go through it all. It's a compute box as a service that's been in the sport for a long time. But it's also like you're not out front. You know, you're not a front-facing person, although after this, I hope people can understand how much you do love the sport and how many insane fights that you were at and moments that you were a part of. 40 years plus in boxing, which I like to say that boxing is like dog years. I don't know what 40 times seven. That's like 280.

So 280 years in boxing. How did you do that first? That's a good question. You know, they say if you love what you're doing, you never really work a day in your life. So I really love boxing from the beginning. So that was really a driving force. Plus, it's under my own business, something I created, we created with, you know, with Logan Hobson back in the day. So when it's your own business, you tend to, you know, be a little more diligent, go to an extra mile.

And especially with boxing, where, as you know, their critics abound. plus we also started with the best client there could ever have been in boxing, which is HBO. So there's a standard that was set from day one that we worked under the best Ross Greenberg and his crew. So we learned from the best. We learned what was demanded each and every show. And I just kept telling myself over the years, you know, you're only as good as your last. show, which is true. And I think part of it is a competitive nature as well, you know, being an athlete or, you know, you've become, you've become a competitive person as well.

And when it's your own business, you're going to do all you need to do to survive. And somehow we managed to survive 40 years, as you mentioned. I've been around it since birth. So I've been around the sport, but it's way different when you're around it and you're just tagging along with your dad to events and then versus being in the sport and depending on it for your income and it being your your livelihood. And I think I'm on like 10 years of it being my main source of income and it's very frustrating, but it's very rewarding too. It's like one of the best sports when done right.

There's chaos every day. The business is horrendous. The fights are amazing. The fighters, their stories are so cool, getting to grow up around Roy Jones and all the HBO fighters, all the ESPN guys and all the people around the sport. the characters growing up was made me love it. And you talked about the drive to be the best. I think that's the number one thing that I've learned from you over the years.

It's like you have an insane drive to be number one. It is sports, you've been doing it for 40 years, and you still are obsessed with being the best, putting out the best service, making sure we squash all the competitors and all that. I find that very, very admirable. But I want to talk about the beginning of Compubile. box for those out there that don't know how this service came to be.

I think it's one of the, I'm a little biased, but I think it's one of the coolest innovative story. So please share with us how you came up with this concept and how it came to be. Well, it started in, what, 1984. Me and Logan Hobson were hired as boxing editors at a company called Sports Information Database, which was really ahead of its time. It was a large company that the idea was to gather data, put it into a database on all different sports. And if you're in a press box with a computer, you could access the database and pull out information.

So the concept was tremendous. While we were there as boxing editors, somebody came in with a tennis program. He had gone to the U.S. Open and basically created a. box score for tennis. He showed it. It was, you know, first serve aces and all the different statistics that come about in tennis and all on this laptop. He took it to the event and recorded and there was this box score. So me and Logan were sitting there one day. We couldn't stand the guy who ran the company. The drive was in New Jersey, Hasbrook Heights, New Jersey from Long Island, which is a hall.

So that was getting old. And one day we were sitting there, like, say, are you thinking what I'm thinking? And I'm like, yeah, we should try something like this tennis program for boxing. And then, you know, the wheels started turning. Well, everything in boxing revolves around a jab. So we got to have a jab, jab connect, jab miss. And then not a jab is, we call the. other punch that evolved into power punch. So that's the basis of it. So we had the program

written by someone at the company. We took it to some off-tivy fights. We went down to Atlantic City. We did some shows. A garden at the time was doing monthly shows. And I'll never forget John Condon, who was the voice of the garden at the time, voiced their Knicks, Rangers. He was like the host. And when you went to an event at the garden, you heard John Condon's voice. He was the objective producer of the monthly boxing series on MSG Network. And John McDonough, who I think you've met over the years at MSJ, was the producer. And we said, we have this program.

Can we try it on your show? They said, yeah, sure, come on. Do it. Come on in. We recorded that. We recorded several. I think we maybe did two months' worth of shows. And then we took it to Ross Greenberg at HBO because I had worked with Ross as a freelance researcher at HBO. I was working at Sports Illustrated at the time. And HBO was in the same building. So we had a couple of recordings, took it to Ross, took the computer in, showed him how it works. This is basically what it does. We take one fighter each, which I think was a big, big selling point for far as accuracy, because we're watching one fighter each, not the whole fight. You signed one fighter, and that's your guy. So he looked at it, he looked at the tape, and he's like, all right, well, yeah, let's try it. I'm sitting there. Really, it was like startling.

Were you expecting him to say that? Or you're expecting it to be like he's not going to buy this? We didn't know. Honestly, I didn't know what to expect. I know Ross respected my work because I, like I said, I did the research for a boxing's best series. That's how I met him. And he was familiar with the work that I had done and, you know, the diligence, whatever you want to call it. But that research is one thing.

Counting punches live at a fight is another thing. But I think he- No one's ever done that. Right. No one's ever done it. I think he said, let's give it a shot. Even though it was HBO, which was the biggest platform, you know, ever. So he goes, all right, let's give it a shot.

He said, go outside, talk to Floater's Secretary, tell you guys going to be working, Bramble Mancini rematch in Reno. This was in January. We did the demo in January. and we were February 15th, 85, was the first fight. So we're like, okay, I never forget going out, walking out of his office, going down the hallway to the elevator. It was like the Seinfeld scene where they look at each other and they say,

we're in business. I remember saying this. I want to backtrack a little bit because that's an amazing story. But in terms of it, it was just pretty much just a light bulb went off over your heads, right? That's the type of the, I've heard the story a few times that never gets old. But like it just felt like a light bulb went off as your guys were sitting there. Because there's one thing to watch a fight at that moment. And you see tail of the tape.

And it's not a stat-driven world in the 80s like it is now with analytics and how teams look at numbers and how fans look at numbers. It was a little different back in the 80s. It was much more of a simpler time when it comes to watching sports. So it's safe to say that it was legitimately like a. a light bulb moment over your head with obviously a little bit of foresight. Well, yeah. We remember saying that really boxing had no statistics. There wasn't much, like you said, there weren't many statistics on any, if you watch any

baseball game. Was there a calling for it? Was there, you know, there wasn't like Twitter or the internet or was there people out there like clamoring for stats in boxing? Not really, not that they know of it. But we did read, we did remember saying that all you have in boxing is the tail of the tape. So, you know, we would, I remember thinking, wow, it would, you know, nice to have a little bit more. He had a little bit more to a telecast.

And then when he came in with the computer, with the laptop computer, with the, with the tennis program on it, it was like, okay, now we're connecting the dots. We have this thirst. Plus, I had gone to a couple of shows for HBO as a researcher, as a stage manager. And I remember watching the telecast and say, boy, I would love to, you know, be part of that telecast. Get involved somehow, you know, but not just as a, you know, a locker room guy. I wanted to be part, you know, part of the telecast. So it sort of all came together. But it was really no clamoring for stats, but in my mind, I'm like, it would be nice if we could add something additional to, you know, to each show.

And plus it was a great thing. Some people say the 80s was the greatest time for boxing, period. So it was just like the perfect storm where, you know, we come along and, you know, came up with this program. and on HBO, which was, like I said, was the main platform then. So it was just like, you know, right place at the right time and perfect storm, all the cliches you want to use. But I also believe if you really want something and you dream about something, it sounds corny, but dreams can come true.

I remember watching fights and looking at Caesar's Pavilion and in the background and saying, man, I got to get there. I got to be poor of that. I got to be part of that. And, you know, it just, it happened. So we were just very fortunate. And then, you know, the trick was to stay there, too. It's one thing to get to that point.

And, okay, we're on HBO. We're doing great. But you have to be damn accurate, too. So, which was a motto that we came up with. Me and Logan used to say, after every fight, fooled them again. And then we look at each other to say, yeah, but we're only as good as the last fight. So it was just something that, you know, you guys aren't, you guys aren't accurate anyway. We're not accurate. That's the main thing you hear, right? I've heard that a few times.

Yeah, but. I've viewed them over the years, 40 years later. 40 years, though, I think we were, you know, doing something right. But the service involved into more than just live stats, as you know, there's research involved where we come up with, you know, profiles on fighters. And there's a lot more moving parts now than just the actual live count. But that's how it. Yeah. I want to. I want to get back to, yeah, I want to get back to Ross Greenberg. And there are some listeners here that understand how big of a name. Russ Greenberg is and was in boxing.

He was the president of HBO sports for a number of years during some of the biggest years of HBO. But if you dig a little deeper, you would know that Ross is like a big time innovator. He came up with the concept of an unofficial scorer, which was Harold Leibman. He came up with the concept of microphones in the corner so we can hear the, the, what's going on in the corners, overhead cameras. So he was an innovative guy. So when you guys came into his office, part of this amazing story of luck, fortune,

you know, good timing and perseverance and all of that. You were talking to the right guy because he was a guy that always wanted to push a telecast forward. So when he saw something that no one else had, he saw something that has never been done before. His brain started turning. And he was like, yeah, I'll give it a shot. Okay, next week or next month.

And one of the biggest fights on HBO between Ray Mancini and Libison Bramble, you guys are in business. So that must have been an unbelievable feeling walking out of the HBO studio that day. Just backtrack, too, let's not forget it. When I mentioned Perfect Storm, the format of HBO fit well, too, because there were no commercials. So that allowed Ross to be creative, like you said, to have the corner mic, you know, and to bring in the score, to bring Harold in, and now to do stats, because when you cut away to,

if our network, boxing was all network TV, when you cut away to a commercial, you come back out of the commercial, the bell rings the next round starts, and then you don't want to be necessarily putting stats over, over action all the time, unless you do it right away, you know,

right out of the bell. So he, the format of HBO also allowed for us to gain entry there because you didn't cut away to commercial. commercials between rounds. So he was looking for filler, you know, another filler and, you know, here comes CompuBox. So I wasn't even born in 1985. So CompuBox outdates me. At the time, you had three kids. There's probably a lot of pressure on you to get this to work. One thing I do remember, though, is the size of the computer. This wasn't a laptop, MacBook that you could slide into your

backpack. This was the biggest, this is the biggest thing. It was the size of this table right here. How much it away like 40, 50 pounds. The computer. I remember it had a... Yeah, it probably weighed 30. Yeah, it probably weighed 30. Yeah, it probably weighed 30 pounds. I don't know. 35 pounds. And I remember

it had the brown screen with the yellow font. Yeah, but I also remember it was that we were not allowed to even look at it when it was in the basement of your, the basement office of your, uh, of our old house. Because if that thing went down, copy box goes down. Yeah, that was

it, man. That was the likelihood. It was, you know, obviously when Earl, it was a one of the first, they call them laptops. It was called a portable computer. They won't even call laptop. That was nothing portable about that thing. The thing was, you know, the thing was 35 pounds, but the screen was minute. It was all guts.

It was all guts. And then this little amber color screen that we used to have to squint to look at it. Because a lot of the fights were outdoors back then, too, at Caesars or wherever we were. So we used to put a little shade over it. And then over time, it evolved into, you know, bigger screens, lighter computers. But I remember lugging that thing through some airports on a connection flight. And it was not always fun or coming home from three nights and three days in Vegas lugging that thing. So me and Logan used to alternate.

Your turn to carry it. I remember him smoking the cigarette and carrying a computer. One time he had a bad leg. I'm like, you look at you. You got shot. He's got the computer. He's dragging his leg with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. I'm like, man, people can see you now.

But anyway, yeah. Shout out to Logan Hobson. Yes, sir. Co-owner and co-creator, who you still keep in touch with today and is an absolute legend in the boxing world. But to the first fight, Livingston, Bramble, Ray Mancini, which is a pretty legendary fight. Crazy fight to work for your first one.

What were the emotions ringside when you were doing this? I was just locked. I wasn't nervous. I was just locked in. It was like, okay, man, let's do it. The funny thing was, it was a rematch too. And the funny thing was, it was in Reno, Nevada. Mancini was the big favorite.

Everyone loved Ray Mancini. Of his style, bang, bang style. And Bramble was, you know, the outlaw, the roster man with the dreads and talking crazy shit. And it was in the Reno, Lola, Event Center. which was loud. It sounded like 30,000 people in there. And the way the fight played out, Mancini was busier. Mancini was throwing 100 punches around.

Crowd going crazy, everything he throws. And Bramble was countering everything. Bramble was probably throwing half the amount of punches, but landing like 50%. Beating up Mancini. But the crowd's going crazy. Turns out Bramble wins the fight. But I think one judge gave it to Mancini because of the, aggressiveness and a couple of writers also favored Mancini and here come the numbers showing

you know Bramble landed I don't know what it's half his puncher so he probably landed 400 something Mancini probably threw 1,300 and landed less than 30 percent so right out of the gate it was a little controversy well this computer says that Bramble threw less was more accurate but Mancini was the busier fighter so right out of the gate we were Right in the middle of something. So from day one, there was controversy. And 41 years later, there's controversy because I know you'll say this and you reiterate it. Like the stats would never, the company was never made in the service to score a fight.

That's number one since day one, right? No. A mission statement is like it's a barometer of a fighter's activity. We've shown you what a fighter was throwing, how many they were throwing, what kind of punches, what percentage. But over time with so many lousy decisions in boxing and our stats would usually back and show the correct winner, people kind of started leaning on it. Yeah. I mean, it helps. And another thing I love too is when Larry Merchant on the first ever broadcast, the copy box was on, on this Livingston Bramble, Raymond Sini broadcast, called it a computer toy.

Oh, that, yeah, I was fuming now. I was pissed at that, yeah, a computer toy. Yeah. Because back then, you feel like, like I said earlier, like stats weren't a big thing. Computers weren't like part of society. They definitely weren't part of sports. And you have Larry Merchant, who was the old, even then was old, was the old writer, was like the purest. Like, I don't need stats.

I don't need a computer. I had my own eyes and smoking a cigarette watching a fight. So now when he introduced something as, you know, he was. innovative as a computer into a sporting event like boxing, which is not really a stat sport to begin with, is more of an opinion-based. I can understand where he's coming from. Obviously, you guys buried the hatch and he became a good friend. And I remember growing up talking to him and just being kind of scared of, a little bit

of scared of him, but also like, man, that guy's kind of cool, but he's really old, but he's like mostly nice, but he's kind of a dick. Like, he was everything. He was a little bit of everything. Well, forget, he was its old. He was a journalist. first. He was a writer. He was an editor, newspaper guy from the Dick Young, I mean, school of journalism. So these guys were no, no BS gruffy kind of dudes. That's who we were

dealing with. Plus, like you said, in boxing, everybody's an expert. I don't need, I don't need a computer to tell me what a, you know, what a fighter's throwing. But I used to go to Ross after the fight. I'm like, well, we're all in the same team here. What, you know, What is he, don't listen to him. Don't worry about him. That's Larry. The fact that you would even go and say that is still tried and true to what you are today. If something pisses you off, you would dress it head on.

So I probably would have just been like, okay, so I don't want to piss off Larry Merchant. Logan used to say, oh, don't, don't go. Don't do it. And I used to, right at the truck. We used to meet after the truck. Ali Dunlop was Ray Leonard's, like, mentor. He used to travel with Ray. He was like, would look after.

Ray and whatever. And he used to set me off. I used to walk past him. And he go, like, Larry did it again. I'm like, then I would march. But like you said, we smoothed it over. And guess what? The last 10 years of Larry being at HBO, he would call.

He would call and ask for stats. The first time he called, I'm like, he called, how, Bob, this is Larry. I'm like, do I know you? he goes, very good at his shops a little bit. This is Larry Merchant, and then he would ask a question about a stat. So he came full circle.

Well, I mean, I finally got into broadcasting, and I think that's the number one tool for the CompuBox is it helps a broadcast. I mean, you can attest this way better than me. The amount of people,

broadcasters in the game today that hit us up for the stats or say, oh my God, this is, it helps tell the story of a fight. It helps tell you. Aral Spence,

throw 75 punches around. Terrence Crawford throws 40 it gives you an idea of what's going to happen in the ring so i understand where larry's hesitance at first but you know he was he was an interesting guy growing up to being around him jim lampli growing up around him was absolutely surreal and then getting to work with them years later many many years later at pbbb.com the hbbohs were amazing so first fights lipperson bramble raymancini tell everyone what you the fourth fight you ever did actually was the third the second fight was was March was Larry Holmes, David Bay, which was a heavyweight fight.

Not much happening there. Third fight we ever do, Haglehurst, Caesar's Palace, beautiful night. Who would expect the go down the way it did? Of course, Marvin had fought Duran, and he was tentative against Duran. In fact, Duran was in that fight. It was a close fight. And so Marvin, you know, his whole MO in training camp was seeking to destroy, you know. And Joe Conicelli, the late Joe Cornicelli, who was also a part of the Compubach's team,

was in Hagliss camp as a PR person back then. This was before he worked for Compubach. And I remember him saying, the Marvin trained like a Spartan man. He's going to come out. He's going to jump all over Hermes. going to jump all over. So I had that in the back of my mind. So bell rings, and we all know what went down.

They throw in like the wing and punches from the first second of the fight. First round ends. I look down at the screen. Marvin, 83 punches thrown. 40-something landed. No jabs. Like, holy shit. I look at Logan's numbers.

Logan had, had, uh, Hurons 81. 40 very close which was you know told the story of what happened in that first round so and then everybody ran with those numbers but I think that's kind of solidified us too

in the eyes of the of HBO and the public wow we just saw you know a crazy round like that and the numbers bore out what you know what we saw when it was 80 something

Nobody really knew back then what was 80 punches around because we had no state. That's funny you say that because just doing it for the third time, you would think like 400 punches thrown. Just jamming the buttons, jamming the buttons. But 88 is what that's what it was. 88 is a good round. It's not anything like extraordinary, but it's also not a low amount of punches. It's a measured, ridiculous attack that we saw from Hagley. But not just 88.

How about 40? 40 landed. They were thrown, but they were late. And we both, you know, had, you know, both them landing in, you know, around 40 in that round. So it was just crazy. And it was very, honestly, it was very satisfying, too. When that fight was over to say, oh, man,

this, maybe we got something here. Because if we're able to count that, get through that first round and be accurate, then what's going to top, what's going to top that down the road? nothing. But that's a really good point because you got thrown into the fire the deep end really fast because I eventually grew up to be a CompiVox counter and I remember doing Mayweather McGregor, which obviously does not belong in the same breath as Hagler-Herns. But it had a lot of

eyeballs on it. And I remember right before the bell rang having the most amount of nerves, but like really into it and excited. You have to like, you have to really lock in and then you go into a zone that you didn't even know was capable of. But I can't believe you were at Hagler. Herons. That's wild to me because that's considered, that's the fight that everyone still brings up to this day. You know, Carr Anthony Towns, our beloved New York Nick brought it up after they won the title. After the Knicks won the title. He goes, that was Hagler-Herns. You know, the game four was Hagler-Herns. Do you remember specific things outside of the numbers and just the human experience of the build-up to the fight, how the fight played out, and the aftermath?

The build-up was electric because, you know, it was Tommy Herms, who was, we always came to fight. And it was Hagler defending his title. The fight itself, I remember, even with the headset on, I remember the crowd roaring. You know, this unbelievable after the first round. In fact, I think I took the headset all. I kept them on to be able to talk to the truck.

But I took the headset off after the first round. And the place was going crazy. It sounded like there were 50,000 people there. Everyone's standing and jumping, and I'm like, that's only the first round. Get back into it, man. Because, you know, we knew the fight wasn't going to last long, but it was just, it was a surreal night. And then the aftermath, like you said, everyone, everyone's talking about it. In fact, had the bars and stuff.

It's not like Twitter. There's no Twitter around, so you really have to just go touch grass and actually talk to people. It was such a high afterwards. It was that season. everybody at Sears was like the whole casino. Everybody was going crazy. It was not believing what they had seen. And even Hagler went on Johnny Carson.

And Johnny even mentioned about the stats. No way. Yeah, Marvin. I don't know this story. No way. That must have blew your freaking mind. As a Johnny Carson fan, as much as a Johnny Carson fan, you must have been like, I can't even believe life.

We picked in 1984. What could top that, really? Well, one thing is you got the bug, because I tell people all the time, like, there's nothing like a big fight, the adrenaline, and then the feeling after a big fight, you hadn't been to any big fights. Like, you know, like, I, you really haven't. As a teenager, you know, Graham's didn't bring in big fights. No.

That was a, you were at the, quite arguably the best fight ever. I mean, up there with Gotti Ward and some others, Ali Foreman and Ali Frazier, you weren't those but that's regarded as one of the most action-packed unbelievable fights and you were there as a you know outside of the stats the human side of it like i said it's still to this day still in awe of what happened there um and then you know how many years ago was that so um long time ago it keeps you coming back let's put it that way you know yeah you chase the high you get the high you chase it that's right you can you sit down and you're the next show and then okay and then but i know Well, the only talk about with Algeria on the show all the time is that, you know, this fort will pick you up.

It will knock you down. Like we travel all over pretty much every weekend. We're traveling. And, you know, it's a vicious cycle of, oh, I'm excited for this fight. Fight happens. You get agamped up. And then there's a high. There's a low.

And then you send your couch for a few days. And then you're like, all right, I'm ready for the next one. And this is this era of boxing, which just doesn't even compare to the 80s. So from 1985, we fast forward to 1987, Sugar Ray Leonard. versus Hagler, you were also there. This is a common theme here is that you were at every big fight

from about 1985 to current day. That one, I feel like, was even bigger in terms of the magnitude. That one was, it was, but it was more tense. Everybody, because we had, Ray had worked for HBO. So we got to know him, everybody on the crew, you know,

at the production meetings, the live shows. and so we knew him. It wasn't just some fighter. And plus he was probably well-known fighter at that time. That's the Hagler, maybe Tyson. But Ray Leonard was Ray Leonard, the gold medalist, fought Duran, you know, in 1980. So going into that fight, honestly, everyone thought he was going to get destroyed

because he had been laid off for three years. The first comeback fight, he got knocked down by some journeyman named, I think, Kevin Howard, knocked him down. And I remember saying, I just hope he doesn't get destroyed. And we all know what happened. But it was more tense. That was more surreal than Hagler-Herns because I'm like Ray Leonard is in there

with Hagler. And he's winning. He wins the first four rounds because Haggard came out. Orthodox didn't throw any punches. And so, yeah. But again, after when that fight ended, there was another feeling that it's hard, it would be hard to top,

you know, anything moving forward after what Ray pulled off that night. It was just incredible. Right. Hagler and Hurons was a big name. Hagler's a big name, but none of them were as big as Ray. So him being in that fight made it even bigger,

him coming off of the long layoff, him beating Hagler. And still I think is the one of the most arguable fights ever. Like I had Ray, Leonard on the show before we added out Chris Algeria as the co-as. I would have a different guest every week and Ray came on and he says people still come up to them

and say you lost. People still come up to them and say you won. This is 80, 30 plus years later. That must have been an unbelievable. I remember watching the legendary nights and seeing how many people were the celebrities that were there and just can't beat that. There was nothing like it. Especially again, it's Caesar's Palace, the outdoor

arena. You know, the seizures in the background, they used to drape a huge flag down the side of the Caesar's Pavilion during the National Anthem. And then, you know, you get a nice night, 75 degree night in the desert. Nothing like it. And then you, the fight is like, and if the fight's a good fight, it's just, there's nothing like it. So you mentioned that Ray used to work at HBO and so you guys used to hang out. Any stories you want to share?

We had some good times, you know. Ray was right. I mean, he was probably one of the most famous athletes in the world at that time. At that time, he was. You know, if we went out somewhere, we weren't waiting online. If we weren't with Ray, we would get in... Wait a second. Tell the story of when before Hagler and Leonard agreed to fight.

Wasn't there something of... You ran into Hagler at a club with Ray? We were in a club, and Hagler was in... Hagel was in... In a men's room. Goes into the men's room. And then Ray goes in, and I happen to be in there, failing men, just to see what was going on. Because I saw Hagler heading that way, so I'm like, I'm going to, I got to see what's going on here.

So Haglu, just clean, watch it, drying his hands. And he goes, hey, Ray, what's up? And Ray goes, looks at him and goes, I'm not here to make friends, Marvin. You know, not, not tonight, Marvin. And he just walks out. So Ray was, you know, already at that time, doing a little trying to get in Marvin's head, which he did. He clearly intimidated Hagler.

So Ray played it, you know, played the badass, you know. These are the stories that maybe want to get into the sport. Like, sadly, there's no real characters left anymore. It's a way different sport now. I don't want to harp too much on that. But those stories alone. Well, how about, how about two? We were in Ray's Lennon's,

training camp, too, for the Hagla fight. They asked. Yeah, because a lot of times before the stats were so available, fighters would hire you guys to help formulate a game plan, right? Yes. And Ray, because we knew him, we went in, we did, we counted Hagla fights. We counted like, I don't know, whatever, eight of his previous fights. And we found that he basically, he was busy.

He would throw his 60 punches, 70 punches. Remember, he started slow. His lowest output was in the first couple of rounds. So we recommend, I mean, we recommend it. We showed them the stats in Manali, and we said, man, Ray should come out. If Marvin comes out slow, Ray should take advantage and, you know, throw punches. Don't come out tentative. And that's what happened.

Ray won the first four rounds, which won them to fight. Marvin came out Orthodox through 16. punches in the first round and, you know, it was slow, slow and tentative. And Ray came out, I'll give Ray a lot of credit because everyone thought Marvin was going to jump all over Ray coming off a three-year layoff. It was the opposite way around Marvin came out very tentative, didn't throw punches, and Ray put rounds in the bank, which, you know, proved to be the difference in the decision. We're in 1987 now, but this time Mike Tyson has already burst. on to the scene. What was your earliest work election of Mike Tyson?

Tyson, first time we saw Tyson was upstate New York. It was an ABC fight. We weren't doing coffee box, but we went up there because all we heard was this guy to Tyson, Tyson. So we drove up there. In fact, Jim Lample was on the call. He was still working for ABC back then. And he was in a small arena in Albany. It was Albany, New York, maybe 8,000 people. And the aura, when he came in the ring, to walk into the ring, you know, with no, no socks, no robe, he said, glad that it led it up. It was the aura he gave off was unbelievable. And that, he just destroyed. I think it was Justin Ferguson in a couple rounds.

But, yeah, it was something you've never seen before, especially from a heavyweight, you know, we used to seeing, you know, the life. either ways but seeing a guy like Tyson you know how heavyweights resonate there's nothing like there's nothing like a heavyweight fight if it's you know if it's done the right way and Tyson just it's crazy to think like there's no there was no Twitter there's no social media like there was the way that the hype would grow it would just be from word of mouth it would be from Sports Illustrated I mean the news obviously is television but that probably made his aura and his grow even more yeah Yeah, you didn't, right, there were newspaper.

You read the newspaper. You saw video, occasional video on him. But it wasn't like you said, like you see it every day. So there was more of a mystique about him than there is with some fighters today because you see them every day. You see videos him. It was like something, honestly, that you've never seen. Plus his style, too.

He came out to destroy. Ferocious. Something ferocious. So in the mid-to-late 80, mid-to-late 80s. you have the four kings all fighting each other you have a really vibrant heavyweight picture you have other weight classes that are filling out and having great fights on their own so that must have been an unbelievable time is there a part of you that was like okay like did people even think about the health of boxing as much as we talk about it today or was it just like it wasn't you didn't even think about it was just like okay what's next what fight is next um he's fighting it was unbelievable but we got spoiled too because you just expected there were so many great fighters around and they fought each other and they fought free world. It's hard to think

about boxing not having that cloud over it where what's going to save it, what's going to help it, what can we do to make it better? It was just the end of it. It was just good times after good times like we're the number, we're one of the top sports in the U.S. Maybe the world. There was always

okay there were always a few bad decisions here and there but as soon as the good fight came along the stench run away and we were sitting at another great fight and like I said, they fought each other too and they fought frequently. They were fighting three, four times a year. Delaware fought five times one year.

Roy Jones was busy three times a year. So you saw these guys, okay, some of, they weren't always the top opponents, but you saw them, they fought, and they just kept the ball rolling. So, yeah, we never thought about, geez, you know, what's, is boxing in trouble? There was no reason to even think that

because there were so many great fighters who fought and they stayed busy. So you see the rise of Mike Tyson. Obviously, you see the fall of Mike Tyson. Literally, the fall. You were there in Tokyo, Japan, when Mike Tyson lost the Buster Douglas to the craziest upset in the history of sports. Please tell us about that night. Another crazy one.

Yeah, Tokyo Dome, Tyson was signed to fight Holofield. but they wanted John King, wanted to milk, you know, Milk Tyson. And Japan wanted Tyson. So they figured, well, we'll do it, stay busy fight before Holofield, just to make, you know, make a boatload of money, put it in a Tokyo dome. Because Tyson was like Godzilla over there. I mean, there's something they, we've never seen, and over there in Japan, it was something they, I'm sure they've never seen.

So they put him in with Buster Douglas, who was a good fighter, but it's like a journeyman kind of fight, off and down. Some fights he'd look great. Other fights, he's not good. And Don King controlled all the heavyweights back then. So they said, I have Bustle, you know, he'll get hit. He'll roll over. It'll be over. Everyone will get paid.

And we move on to Holofield. little did we know Douglas' mom had passed away earlier and he was motivated. He got in shape. He wasn't afraid of Tyson,

which was rare too because that earlier Tyson won a lot of his fights before the bell even rang. It would just intimidate the opponent at the press conference and in the ring

prior to the first bell so bad that they were just like crumble. Douglas was not, you know, not buying it. He was there to win the fight, and he had the skills, too. He had a great, had a good jam, he had movement. He had a little pop, and he put it all together that night and beat the living shit out of Tyson.

I remember hearing punches landing through my headset, because the fans in Japan, they really don't cheer much during. after their round ends, they gracefully clap. But during this no roared crowd, like if you watch Tyson Holderfield, you can hear people going crazy. Not the case there. So you could hear these punches ringing off of Tyson's head

and we're like, wow, one round after another, he's just getting destroyed. And he ended up knocking him out. So that was another memorable night in Japan. The full, you know, you get right behind where you're sitting. There's like a little album and you have, I would go through it as a kid and there was a picture of Tyson literally on the canvas. Right. Which is probably one of the craziest sports moments ever.

If it wasn't in Japan, there would be so many people out there saying that they were there. Because people like to lie about it. But the fact that it happened in Japan with the quiet crowd and I don't know if they're good sports fans, but I don't know if they fully understood what was unfolding. Do you think so? In the crowd? Yeah. No, I think everybody, in myself included, I mean, we could see that Douglas was tattooing him, but in the back of our minds, you're all thinking he's going to eventually catch him with something.

I'm sure the crowd was thinking that too. This can't happen. This is like Tyson. In fact, he did knock him down. Tyson knocked him down, I think, in the fourth or fifth round. People overlooked that part of it. He did. He hit him with a tremendous uppercive.

And Douglas got up. He got up. And by the end of the round, he was back tattooing Tyson. That's when I said, oh, man, just I don't, Tyson's not going to win his fight because Douglas got up and went right back to business. That's surreal. Did you understand the moment of it? Did you understand the magnitude of it?

Well, yeah, everybody was shocked because Tyson was like built up. to be this indestructible force. And the fact that it was in the Tokyo Dome with no noise, no reactional, it was like surreal. So it's like it was happening, but it wasn't really happening. And then, of course, I was actually sitting next to Holofield. Holofield was there because he was supposed to go in the ring after the fight. And, you know, they were going to do their face off.

I remember looking at Holoffield. I'm like, and he was like, he just looked at me, well, you know, it was like, tried not to show his emotion, but he was shocked like everyone else. Like, and probably figured it goes about 20 miller down to Drane or else. But they eventually did fight. But at the time, like the what ifs, like he got in there and destroyed Buster Douglas next. But that was February 11th, 1990. Four days later, this happens.

There it is. That's a shot. Tyson, right. And back then, HBO would show the replay of the fight. And he would have, you know, in the studio. And Tyson showed up.

I was shocked to see him, honestly. So we go down to the studio. You were what? Not even three years old. Yeah. Two and a half, three. You said, my mom came, you know, I'm looking at the picture here in my office, too.

And we, we, I said, we got to get a picture. You were sleeping, actually. I was holding you. You were sleeping. And then Tyson came over. And I tapped you on, I tapped you on the shoulder. And you look at him, you go, that's Mike Tyson.

So a three-year-old even recognized Mike Tyson back then. And then he said, it is. I remember him just touched your hair. He's like, he's got, wow, he has nice hair on my eye. Let's go. Get him out of there. Get him out of here. Obviously, like.

Get away from my kid. Getting to know Mike over the years now and showing him that photo, having him on this show, working with him with MVP when he fought Jake Paul, which is just unfathomable, being on the broadcast for that. Showing Mike the picture and him losing his mind over it was one of the most surreal moments ever, like a full-circled thing because he couldn't believe it too. Then he gave me some more insight. The reason he's wearing glasses is to cover up all the bruises and the cuts. His right eye was.

swollen grotesquely. I mean, that was a week later, but I'm sure it was still, it was bad, you know, he got pummeled. Yeah, he was trying to reverse it. And I remember him telling me that he even knew that he really lost,

but Don King was making him do it. They were trying to say that it was the knockdown was a long count, which, you know, and they tried to appeal to the WBC at the time that it was, but, you know, it didn't go anywhere. So when Tyson goes down,

Obviously, the big theme in boxing is like there's always going to be another star. There's always someone that's going to take the mantle, whether it's Ali to Sugar Ray Leonard. And also Mike Tyson comes out of nowhere. Then we're into the 90s and we have Oscar Delahoya, Floyd Mayweather, Manny Packia, Roy Jones, an unbelievable heavyweight division with Riddick Bow and Holyfield. Lennox Lewis. The Clitch goes right at the 2000 with the rise of Mayweather, Pacquiao, HBO, really becoming like a, a, force in the mid-90s, early 2000s. I want to ask you, I have a lot of these like teed up and stuff. What's like one of your favorite fights that you ever got to be live for?

Well, outside of Hagler-Herns, we were at Gotti Ward. Goddy Ward won, which was utter brutality. Do you remember that you asked me to go and I stayed back because I wanted to go to Melanie Stafford Sweet 16. Yeah, but no one expected, nobody expected, obviously, that kind of fight because Ward was, I wouldn't say a journeyman, but he, you know, he lost a fair share of fights

and God he could, you know, it was God he had all the talent, but he could be beat too. And he neither one, it wasn't for a title. In fact, it was a boxing after dark at the Mohegan Sunday, and it was no poster for the fight. It was just, this was a, this was a,

this was a, of Lou DeBella, the genius of Lou DeBella, who was running HBO boxing then, he figured, you know what, they don't have to have a title, this is boxing, which is what boxing after dark was all about. There was World Championship boxing, and they started boxing after dark, which is with these lesser-known guys, or less, not necessarily always for a title, but guys who are going to bring it every, you know, every fight. So Lou knew Mickey Ward, of course, you know, from the club shows or whatever, Mickey Ward had

been a fixture on the top rank, top rank on the SPN. So in Katz, Ron Katz, the matchmaker put them guys in tough every show. Every fight, Ward was in dog fights all the time. So he was battle tested and Gotti was Gotti, but nobody expected that kind of fight. So that was another, that was a memorable fight. That was up there with, with Hagleherns as far as, you know, thrill a minute back. and forth. Oh, my God.

Can't have an imagine. Like the famous line. Imagine you had a ticket. Yeah. I mean, you know, and then they actually ended up fighting two more times, but not as brutal as that one. It was a crazy fight. God, he was my favorite fighter growing up.

I just thought he was the coolest guy in the world. He had the Italian last name. He looked cool. He was cool. And I got to watch him fight a lot. That was one of the coolest things about being Bob Kenubio's son. was being able to go to all these fights and having a front row seat, literally sitting on your lap. There were a few years where you missed my birthday.

It was like a two or three year stretch where their fights were falling on my birthday. And this isn't like today where you could tell someone else to go. Like you had to go. You were on the road every single weekend for 10, 12 years straight. And so there's a lot of things you missed. Like you missed a lot of holidays, birthdays. It happens. It's all part of it.

But you were at home a lot too. but I remember like just being a part of the boxing world. Like, for instance, birthday rolls around. You're in Vegas. I think it was Foreman someone, 1992, June 19, 1992. And phone rings. Mom says, come down. Dad's on the phone.

Answer the phone. It's not you. It's George Foreman. Hey, champ. Your dad tells me it's your birthday. I'm like, oh, my God. Hello, George Foreman. Yeah, I just want to, and he's.

telling me to, I'm all right, listen to your parents and have a great day. And I remember two years in a row, a foreman called on the birthday. Yeah, that's great. George was good that way. Of course, if I felt bad being away,

you know, for the birthdays, but that was very... It's part of the gig, and I'm experiencing it now as I work full-time in boxing and I travel. You miss events. You miss holidays. You miss birthdays.

You miss parties. You miss friends' obligations. Cuts into your personal. life. You almost miss the Knicks winning the championship. I made sure to come home for that. But it was an unbelievable life. And when I'm around ringside, because it's very chaotic. So I've been in my whole life. But I now work with MVP. I work with other broadcasts and being ringside. And whenever I see a new person introduced, they hire a new intern or someone else gets thrown into the mix. The ringside is a very, very, very chaotic atmosphere. The whole fight week is chaotic.

It's unlike anything else. But the fact that I've been around it since the young age, I feel oddly calm. Like, I enjoy it. I enjoy the chaoticness of it. I don't know if that's a word. I enjoy that. So, like, from a young age, I feel like this is the only thing I ever wanted to do. And people were like, oh, nepotism and all that crap.

But I'm like, you know what? Like, I grew up around Jim Lampley, grew up around HBO boxing, grew up with Roy Jones. And going to the biggest fights in the world, the first fight I ever went to was Kevin Kelly versus Nassim Hamlet. to Flushing Flesh and seeing in the lights. And I remember thinking my head, this is the only thing I ever want to do. Like, why wouldn't I not want to work in boxing? Like, figure out a way for me to etch out my own path in broadcasting and able to do this show every week with Chris and have all that.

But just growing up around the sport was surreal. And it was literally the coolest childhood ever. So cool. It's intoxicating to get ringsud with the lights. It's the atmosphere. and then it's just two guys in the ring, right? It's just two guys. It's a show.

It's a show. It's a show. It's a show. It's a show. And when the fights deliver, then, you know, there's nothing like it. Some bad ones, too. You got a few clinkers here and there.

But like we said earlier, the good ones are the ones that keep coming back. Yeah. What would you say, like, when you watch boxing now, I know this might be a tough question. and you see like, you know, how it's falling off a little bit, but there's still great stories, there's still great fights, still popularity. What's the biggest, why do you think it is the way it is?

I think because most fighters probably don't have the amateur background that all these great fighters had back in the day. They don't fight as often as they did back then, so they're not as polished. They make a lot of money, young, earlier in their career. So maybe the desire, the thirst isn't there. But I think the biggest, you know, the biggest issue is you don't see these guys fighting enough. That's probably the reason why it's falling off.

Yeah, they're on social media. They're calling this one. This guy's pulling this guy out. But people want to see fighters in the ring fighting. That's what keeps the sport. you know, where it is, you know, where it keeps it, could make it way more popular than it is if they were busier and, you know, fought more frequently. Who's the best fighter you ever seen live?

Best fighter live? Probably Roy Jones. He did stuff in the ring that, you know, we just never seen the hand speed, the power. he was, you know, probably, I think he was probably the most skillful, skillful fighter that I've ever seen. I was with Raoul Marquez this past weekend. He's now with MVP, and I asked him the same question, and he said Roy. Roy did it, you know, he did it all.

I mean, he could do it all. He was so cool to be around him, just in, like, his presence. And, like, he was also doing HBO broadcasting while he was still in his prime. So when we would go to fights, when you guys would bring us to fights, it was like a thrill a minute. Because obviously Jim Lampley, I have a huge broadcast nerd, and just being around him was cool. Manuel Stewart, George Foreman. And then later days, like Max Kellerman, before he got crazy, Max was so cool to sit around and talk New York sports with. Lennox, Foreman.

But then Roy, when Roy really became on HBO, is when I started to get a little bit older and I started to really appreciate the sport and appreciate his greatness. It was like Superman. Holy shit. Roy Jones is at the HBO dinner with us before the fight. He's just sitting there drinking a Coke, eating some pasta, and it's accessible, and I'm just chatting with him. Right.

It humanizes these guys. You actually get to speak to them and see that they're, you know, they're real people, but then when he get in the ring, that's a different story. But, yeah, the whole HBO experience was incredible. I feel very fortunate to be part of that. the right place at the right time and then, you know, just keeping, to do diligence to stay on top, you know, is something that, you know, very proud of. Yeah, I think it's an unbelievable service.

And it's, it fits perfectly into the fabric of boxing. It's a controversial sport. Everyone thinks they knows everything. It's a controversial tool, CompuBox. It was never intended to score fights, but over the course of 40 years, it's going to be people are going to take it any way they want, which is honestly a great compliment to the service

that was still around after 40 years. So people are going to take the numbers and do what they want with them. It's almost become a verb. Like we've heard it in rap songs of a Farrow Monch. That's right. Your weak-ass Compubox shot flew over me. Like I've heard Joe Rogan reference it on his podcast.

I've heard some of my favorite actors, some of my favorite comedians. I remember I was at a random comedy show, Dan Soder, who was one of my favorite comedians. And he does like a great macho man and WWE stuff. And he's sitting there doing a stand-up thing with all my friends. And he's like, yeah, I got to get out of here. I got to go watch Andre Ward versus Chad Dawson. And we're like, what?

And everyone just jetted their head over to me at the table. And the comedian recognized. it. And he stops his set and he goes, why did everyone just look at you when I said that? And I said, oh, yeah, yeah, I'm just a boxing fan. And one of my friends goes, he's being humble, like his dad created CompuBox. And the guy, Dan, sort of stopped the whole set and came right over to me. He was like, are you kidding? Like, tell me how, tell me more about it. Like, you know this fighter? Do you know this fight? Do you know that? And it got to the point where it got really awkward where he was just talking to me for like 10 minutes about boxing. So you just never know who

was a boxing fan and it's such a cool thing that you created um and it's controversial too i know people have their problems with it but i think everyone the right people can respect the story behind it and i want everyone to know that you love the sport like you eat breathe and sleep boxing you're not just some guy that created a service you know and then sold it off or some guy that created a service and handed it off like you to this day you're down there on saturdays 10 different screens open sending stats the time God Grisham sending stats to Joe Tessator getting excited when they read them. That's wild to me after 40 years because I'm like 10 years in and I'm sometimes the sport beats me down.

Especially now too because back with HBO, we did the main event, co-main event. So we were responsible for. Now it's streaming this six, seven fights per card. So it's more responsibility. But, you know, that's how it is. Look at Bob Aram, 94. He still goes, he still goes to the shows. He sits through the, he sits through all the prelamps, right?

He watches. So if it's, you know, if it's, if Bob Arammer can do it, I feel like, you know, like indebted. If I'm getting paid from a service, I feel like I should have, I should have my imprint on, on each show in some way, shape, or form. Speaking of Bob Arammer, you got to tell the story. Which one? Michael Bent, knocks out. out Michael Bent knocks out Tommy Morrison. Michael.

Tommy Morrison was set to fight of Andrew Holyfield. No, he was supposed to fight Lennox Lewis. Lennox Lewis. I always messed that part up. You tell the story, not me. Morrison was supposed to, Tommy Morrison was supposed to fight Lennox Lewis, but they wanted to do a tune-up fight in Oklahoma where Morrison was from. So they put Morrison in with Michael Bent, who was, again, kind of like a Busted Douglas type,

who would look good some nights, not so good. next night. Sure enough, Morrison knocks bent down in the first round, Bent comes back, knocks out Morrison. So we happened to be on a plane with Aaron, a private plane with Aram and the top rank people because we were going from Oklahoma to Vegas for a show to next night. So Aram was good enough to say you guys can fly with us. So we're flying and we're talking about the fight. So Aram pulls out the contract and somebody was going to the bathroom and said, here, take the contract for Lewis, Morrison, and wipe your butt with it because it's useless now. I can imagine him saying that right now.

It was this, yeah, that was, that was typical Aaron, you know, typical Bob Aram. But that's Foxy, again, especially to heavyweights, right? Anything could happen. There's a lot of years that be glossed over, though. But when you talk about, like, they don't fight enough. I think of right away. I think of Oscar De La Jolla, who's a promoter now, who a lot of people, there's a lot of boxing fans out there that only know him as a promoter.

And there's some out there that knew that he was good. But the four or five times fighting a year, Oscar, the popularity that he reached, that was to me, like when I remember the most as a kid is how popular and how much he carried the sport after Tyson. he yeah he was he was a gold medalist um and he but he was a lot of people like envied him too because he had the looks there's golden boy he had the looks he had power he you know had all the skills but he wasn't regarded as a as a true mexican so the mexican fans didn't embrace him right away so you had that little those half the fans wanted to see him get beat and half the fans wanted, you know, wanted to see.

And when women were crazy about them, there were more women at the fights than I've ever seen, too. They were, you know, he had everything. It was a total package. And, you know, he was busy. He fought. He fought, like you said, four or five times a year. And he fought everybody.

Look at his record. He fought everybody. But he wasn't truly accepted until he fought Chavez. And he beat Chavez. twice, in fact, although Chavez was probably a little past his prime by then. But he just destroyed Chavez. And then, you know, that's when Oscar crossed over to, like, you know, being a mega star. It's unfortunate because he's such like, oh, he's has his own stories and his own downfalls.

And the fact that he's still involved with the sport, I think it's an overall net positive. But, you know, he makes an ass of himself a lot of times. But he's, I think he's great. I think he's a great interview. I think he's overall positive for the sport. But it's wild to me when the new school fans, like they kind of just see him as the crazy clapback Thursday guy. This guy carried his sport throughout the 90s.

You can't think of Oscar without Floyd and Pacquiao. Were you there for Pacquiao's debut when he was the late replacement? Yes. He fought on the undercard. I forgot who to fight, who it was. He destroyed this African fighter. Yeah, we didn't know who he was, but he laid this dude out, man, busted his nose.

And I remember saying, I was, you know, somebody that, you know, got to keep an eye on. Look who he for. He fought Ferreira. He fought Marquez. This was at the lower weights. Morales. I remember my first recollection of Pachio, it came from you. I remember you came home from a fight, 2003-ish.

So I was like 16. Like, I was very interested in being with my friends. In hindsight, I wish I would all just went to all these fights with you with age 16 because it was way more interesting than hanging around on Long Island. But I remember you coming home, Bill, you got to watch this guy Pacquio. He had the no fear trunks on. Yeah. He's something I've never seen before.

And I was like, wow, for you to say that, I was like, wow, that's crazy. And remember you have to go watch the replay on HBO. You have to just hope it would come on during the week on like HBO West or something or HBO would replay the fight. And it was 2003. It must have been after one of the Barrera fights. And I remember being like, holy crap. Like, who is this guy, Paci? Yeah, he beat Barrera.

He was a big underdog in that fight. and San Antonio, in fact, and he really dominated Barreira. But before that, before he improved, he was outboxed by Eric Morales. People forget. Morales was a great fighter, too. But all man he had then was the jab, jab,

and then the left cross, and give Freddie Rochel out of credit. And that right hook? Yes, for development, and the foot movement, the foot movement, and the right hook, forgive Freddie. Freddie remembers Freddie's saying If this guy, if he wants to be a great fighter,

he has to get more in his toolkit. And he developed him into a great fighter. Every fight he was looking for the knockout. It's what people want. Unbelievable. Him, Mayweather, Delaware, HBO 24-7. Yeah. And just from like a personal standpoint,

becoming like a teenager now in high school, friends were watching it. it was on before Sopranos. It was on after entourage, Sunday nights. Sunday night on HBO, right? Like people were starting to identify me strictly with boxing in high school or right into college. Like, oh, this is Dan, he's the boxing guy. Because it's such a unique sport and it's such a unique atmosphere, subculture.

But, you know, like guys like Pachia, Mayweather, I look at them differently. And this is why I appreciate fighters so much on this podcast, Chris, too. and if he was here, he would probably agree with me. It's like, we're not going to, for the most part, we don't bash fighters because I look at it different. I look at it. We needed the Tyson, we need all those guys that we just named to help the sport and keep it going to keep the business going. And then I wanted like it to keep going because it was so much fun. So like when Mayweather came around, I was thrilled, like, because people would associate me with Mayweather.

And then I would think about, you know, we need boxing to stay relevant because it's the family business. and still stays relevant up until his day. And yeah, to me, that's when I, like, really took off. It's like mid-2000s, 2006, 2007, Mayweather, Delahoya, right up to Mayweather, Pachia, which I was lucky enough to be there. One of my, I want to tell a story. One of our crazy stories is I went to Mayweather Pachial without a ticket. I was working at Bleacher Report, and we did a bunch of stuff leading up to the fight,

and I was like, I'm going to this fight no matter what. I don't have a ticket. It's the hardest ticket to get in. sports. I had people doubting me. I had people back home saying like, you're crazy. You're not going to get in. And I didn't have a ticket the entire week. And it was really pissing. It was crazy. I was getting so down because you always came through with tickets. One thing about Bob is Bob comes through with tickets. Credentials for my friends, putting my best friends in next to Jim Lampley, always hooking us up with the best situations ever at these HBO fights. But this was something way

different. This is Maywe the Pack, yeah. I'll never forget that week. I'll never forget that morning. Everyone, every big name in media, Stephen A. Smith, you name it, was on the same line because they issued out different credentials every day. And I remember how to go down there and maybe to pick up yours or go down there. I just wanted to see it. I had nothing at that moment. I was, oh, God, I can't believe this. This is something different. And I was resigned to the fact that I was going to go watch it on closed circuit at the MGM Grand, which is still fine. I just wanted to be part of the mix. 11th hour, Frank Belmont. Frankie.

The legend comes through with a credential. I'll never forget it. You said, come to my room. Go over to your room. And there it was, just dangling. And I went by myself. And I remember going to the pre-fight parties. Everyone, Shaq, Mark Wallerberg,

Minnie Me, Denzel Washington, all the New England Patriots, every celebrity. They were flying from the Kentucky Derby, which is on the same night, private jets, landing, coming to the pre-fight parties. alone. And I remember making friends with some other guy that was alone and say, hey, let's power numbers. Let's make believe we're friends. We're not just standing here looking like idiots. Just being a surreal atmosphere and just being part of that. And that to me was like the culmination

of Mayweather Pachia. Yeah, it came too late. Like to me, that was like my Hagler-Herns. Obviously, it wasn't inside of the ring. Although I maintain it was a better fight than people remember. but to me like it was like you had I heard your stories growing up about how you know this night this legendary night I wanted my own legendary night and to me like obviously I was there so I'm a little bias and it's a different perspective that's the most nothing will ever top that in my opinion in terms of the feeling of walking around backstage like when it finally was there yeah obviously like there obviously like there were some other fights like not as not as big that I remember being going to like Cotto Mosley or any of Cota, I went to all of Cotto's fights at the guard. I went to all 10 of them

watching Roy Jones early on, watching Gotti early on, Sergio Martinez, got to watch him from a ringside standpoint in a lot of the heavyweights like being there for Fury Wilder, being there for Pachia's late run with PVC when he beat Thurman. That was a crazy night being next to you for that. But yeah, I wanted Mayweather Pachia was, I wanted that. I wanted that to be my Hagler Hearns, my Hagler, Leonard. I mean, it kind of was, but it wasn't. So I missed all these good times, all these parties over the years. I'm sitting right side. I'm sitting ringside for all I missed all the part now. We, we, we have to. I think I would text you like, oh my God, Denzel Washington's here and you're probably stressed as hell, biggest fight,

sweating, hope the computer doesn't shut off. Of course. And that's the only thing that bothered me was the report times. I used to always complain to Dave Harmon later after, you know, when he took over for like a six o'clock start. Why are we, why do we have to be here at one o'clock? You would say that to him? Well, I got to plug the computer in, do a test. Ah, everyone else is coming. I remember the test. I knew we'd leave. That used to bother me, but, you know, the memories are there and they'll never go away. And like I said before, we were all very fortunate to be involved. You know, you worked your way into this business. Yeah, you may have introduced you to ringside, you know, to get acclimated to what it's like there, but you're,

you're the one that got yourself into this position. We may open the door, but you broke the door down and, you know, put yourself into this position. And I'm very proud of you for the work that you've done in the boxing business was what you said earlier. It's not an easy business. And it's not easy to stay, you know, to stay on top. You got to grind. You got to work every day. And I think you figured that out.

And I learned that lesson years ago. Well, I learned it from you. And here we are. Yes, I learned it from you. I learned about hard work, being the best, having a little bit of an edge, being nice to everyone. Be friendly to everyone. Ringside. Everyone loves you. When you're ringside, everyone's happy to see you.

I feel like I would like to keep that tradition going. A ringside. It's the only thing I ever wanted to do. It's the only thing I know. I wanted to open up this to our listeners to see where it comes from deep inside of me. Like, I'm not a fighter. Chris Algeria is the fighter. He brings a different

perspective. But this is my whole life. This is all I've ever done. Right. Good stuff. I hope everyone enjoyed it. Getting a little emotional. Hope everyone to do it, show. Have me a second.

Happy Father's Day and everyone out there. If you have a dad, call him. All right. I don't know where to go from here. Usually Chris would say something like, Dan, you're an idiot. Dan Shuddley. I'm not going to say that, Dan.

I appreciate you having me. I appreciate you having me on. Let's do it again in another five years or something. sooner. Yes, yes, I got my emotions in check here. Happy Father's Day to everyone out there. Hope you enjoyed this episode. Call your dad if you can, if not. I hope this

helped a little bit as well. We'll be back later next week with another episode. I'm off to the Knicks championship parade. Hopefully I survive. Go Nix. Go Nix. Everyone enjoy the weekend. Keep your hands up at all times. Protect yourself

at all times. Stay out of those DMs.