The Toney - Griffin fight
The super-middleweights
Three months to the day had passed since James Toney's loss. He had to get back into the ring, to recover the myth which Roy Jones had razed. Toney needed to get his mouth working again, to feel the Lights Out bravado returning. Otherwise he was nothing.
For all the treachery he saw in Jackie Kallen, she understood what defeat had done to him. 'His whole identity was crushed. One minute you're the champion and the pound for pound number one; and the next you're basically just another fighter...'
Toney could of ended up as just another fighter in prison; but Sherry worked hard on him. he tried to put some of the old boxing pieces back together. With distrust and hurt still raw, Jackie announced that they would resume thier partnership - at least until her managerial contract expired in July. They chose not to disclose any details of their awkward reconcillation but Jackie, ever the PR queen, attempted to add a terse gloss in public. 'What's past is past,' she said. 'Talking about it is just like opening an old wound. We're looking to the future..'
I thought there was somnething brave, if futile, in their efforts to reunite. 'The problems are behind us now,' she continued more positively, 'everything's on an even keel.' Toney's silence, at least, remained steady.
As much as I liked her to be right, I was equally sure that they were doomed. 'The Lady and the champ' story was almost over - and I hoped it would not end in tragedy.
They made a dangerous choice for Toney's return. His next fight was set for the same date, the eighteenth, and the same ring, the MGM Grand Garden, where he had been decimated by Roy Jones. More significantly, as Lights Out was still too much of a bad man to belive in karma, they selected a slick and unbeaten fighter for his comeback. Montell Grfin, who was trained by the great Eddie Futch, he had been to the '92 Olympic squad with De La hoya. He was the kind of hungry and speedy boxer most camps would have avoided as they looked to ease back into winning ways. A game journeyman was the kind of dependable pug usually selected for such an encounter.
But the Toney way, prior to the disastrous 'Uncivil War', saw him taking on and beating 'anyone, anytime, anyplace'. Before Roy Jones, the idea of Toney being endangered by a fighter even as talented as Montell Griffin would have been riducled.
But Toney's skill had not eroded. They also knew Griffin well. He had spent time in their gym two years before, while nearly signing as a pro with Jackie. Toney had sparred with Griffin and had never been in trouble. Moreover, Lights out might have been defeated by a sensational, 'once in a every-twenty-years' virtuoso like Jones, but he had been weakened by his extreme weight reduction. He was fighting Griffin at light-heavy, which would mean he'd have an additional seven pounds to pack onto his bulky frame. lAstly, BY BEATING gRIFFIN, it would set him up for a crack at one of his new divisions titles.
In Vegas, a less shaken Jackie Kallen flagged the fact that 'James wants a championship belt around his waist again. He wants to show everyone that it wasn't really him that lost to Roy Jones...'
Toney, however came out against Griffin like a man more simulated by the promise of popping another cheeseburger beneath his belt. He'd made the 175-pound light-heavyweight spot without an ounce to spare and he moved around the ring with little of the zest which had oozed from him six months previously. Yet, three inches taller than the stocky Grffin 5ft 7in, he coud use his longer reach to hold off the faster boxer.
Toney's belief that he only had to put in an appearence to to whip up a tasty victory was nourished further in the third. A sweet right hand counter shook Griffin to the base of his shaky boots. His legs wobbled like fruit packed jelly. Toney stood and licked his lips. When he eventually did follow with a scooping uppercut, Griffin had recovered enough composure to make Toney miss so badly that he almost tumbled to the canvas himself.
The fight settled into an uninspiring pattern. Toney chugged along at a pedestrian pace, picking up the odd good round here and there when his hands moved faster than his feet, while Griffin chipped away at both head and body. He rocked Toney momentarily in the seventh, but lacked the power to do more damage. Three quarters of the way through the bout, Toney was ahead on all three scorecards and only needed to exert himself a fraction more to ensure success.
'You're a much better fighter than him'; an agitated Bill Miller urged at the end of the ninth. Quit being lazy.'
But it looked as if Toney had lost his heart in that ring weeks before. Each judge awarded Griffin the last three rounds even though he was barely shading the flickering Lights Out. Griffin displayed none of the sublime abilty of Jones - he just worked harder than Toney.
Kallen, Toney and I still thought he had done enough, even when we heard there was a 114-114 draw amongst the scores. We were convinced that the 115-113 and the 116-112 calls would be made in his favour. But the unthinkable did happen. James had lost for the second time in a row. Griffins own explanation was simple but poignant. 'Toney intimidates a lot of guys, but I had an advantage. I'd stayed in his house so I knew that the James Toney you see out in public, in front of the cameras, is not the real James Toney. you see the real man at home - and he's a nice guy, he's not a loudmouth. He does that just for the camera. even if he'd wanted to intimidate me he couldn't because we'd spent time together as friends. So what could he say to me?'
Roy jones had replaced him as the worlds top ranked fighter; but Montell Griffin had only fought 14 times before. the ferocity in James toney had given away to a numbed dispair.
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