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brought a tear to my eye Tribute to Manuel Magarito
This Saturday night at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Antonio Margarito engages in the biggest fight of his career against the undefeated Miguel Cotto, and the stakes are high in what is the summer’s most anticipated event. For Margarito, after years and years of chasing the game’s marquee names, he finally gets his long-awaited opportunity to headline a major pay-per-view show. Defeating Cotto is a daunting task though, since 32 prior foes have tried with no success to topple the man who is just the latest boxing icon from Puerto Rico.
Some believe that it will take an effort beyond his own capabilities to down Cotto. Make no doubt about it, this is the best opponent he has ever faced. But it would not be accurate to say it's the most difficult circumstance he has ever fought under.
That distinction would have to be his fight against the noted journeyman Buck Smith on October 23rd, 1999 in Fort Worth, Texas. At that time, Margarito was still a fledgling prospect who, after some early losses, was coming in on a nine fight winning streak that had moved his overall record to 14-3. This bout versus Smith was expected to be just another routine outing to continue the development of the raw, heavy-handed slugger from Tijuana.
But on the night before the fight, this bout was put in jeopardy and Margarito's life was altered forever.
"We had just barely come back from the weigh-in, it was around 6:30, 7 o'clock, I remember we went for spaghetti and on the way back we stopped and said, 'Let's relax right here,' at the lobby. When suddenly I hear my name and they called me - it was Sergio," recalled Margarito's co-manager Francisco Espinoza. Sergio Diaz is the other co-manager.
The news wasn’t good. Margarito's wife Michelle, who was in Mexico, received word through her aunt in Southern California that Margarito’s beloved brother, Manuel, had been slain.
It would be Espinoza's job to tell his fighter the tragic news personally.
“Right away I went back to Tony. I said, 'What am I going to do? The fight’s tomorrow.' So I went and told him straight, 'Tony, something happened to Manuel and he passed away,' I never told him how he got killed. He said, 'What? My brothers dead!?!?'
For a few awkward seconds, an eerie silence filled the room, as he just stared back at Espinoza.
“He suddenly started crying, screaming," recalled the manager, who immediately made the decision to scratch the fight. He would go and tell Top Rank's matchmaker, Bruce Trampler, the circumstances surrounding their fighter. “That’s the saddest moment I've ever had in boxing," Espinoza says.
“It was difficult. I left, I walked away for a couple of hours," said Margarito, through Diaz, reflecting back on that period. "I went walking, I came back and I thought, 'Y'know what? I have to do this for myself, I have to do this for my brother.' And I asked if I would be able to go see him before the burial. I would fight this fight and dedicate this to him and that's what I did. I took this fight, and although my body was there, my mind was never there. My mind was on my brother."
Espinoza says that as Margarito gathered himself emotionally, "He called me, 'Francisco, I want this fight, I will fight.' So I went back to Bruce, 'Bruce, Tony says he's going to fight.' He said he was going to dedicate this fight to his brother. And for some reason, the day of the fight, he came out like Buck Smith was responsible for his brother’s death. He went like a lion with this guy."
He would stop Smith in six rounds. From there, the rush was on to get back home.
"I waited for Antonio, from Texas he flew directly to San Diego," recalled his wife, "and what happens in Mexico when you die they bury you right away. He barely made it and saw him. He cried like a little baby. He took his handwraps and gave them to his brother. He made promises he has fulfilled to his brother."
Manuel and Antonio were separated by just a couple of years and they both took up boxing. In a family of four - with two brothers and two sisters - that grew up in the typically poor section of Tijuana, they were best friends.
“My brother and I were always together, we were always together, inseparable," he says. "When I fought here, he would come watch me fight. When he would fight, I would watch him fight. Unfortunately that night he would not go with me. He had just gotten married, he had a child, a daughter and he was not able to join me. That's what happened."
The perpetrators of this crime were never apprehended and no real motives were ever given. Unfortunately, now, more than ever, murder and crime is a fact of life in Margarito's hometown.
"I don't know too much," Diaz says of the details regarding the homicide. "All I know is that he went home, sat down, turned on his television, and was murdered inside his own house."
The story of Margarito's brother really wasn't known outside his inner circle until he revealed it at the post-fight press conference following his sixth-round stoppage of Kermit Cintron in Atlantic City, New Jersey back in April. As he dedicated that performance to him, the story piqued the interest of the media, who asked more and more questions of his brother in the subsequent months. Diaz has mentioned more than once that throughout this particular training camp that his fighter has had problems getting a good night’s sleep. While some of it surely has to do with the magnitude of the upcoming fight, Diaz hypothesizes that rehashing that painful period in his life may have brought about more stress.
But the fighter insists, "It doesn't bother me at all; in fact, I'm happy that people ask and I'm happy that he's out there. I carry him in my heart. So when they ask me, it makes me happy. It does make me a little sad to think about what happened to him. I don't have him with me, but other than that, it doesn't bother me."
He says his brother is always on his mind and in his heart.
"I do constantly think about my brother. I carry my brother in my heart. If anything, as the fight gets closer, I'm dreaming as if we're together or somewhere he's with me. I do dream about him a lot. In regards to the fight with Cintron, that fight was dedicated to my brother because it was his birthday."
Manuel Margarito would've been 32 years old.
In facing Cotto, Margarito is guaranteed $1.5 million. He and his wife now live a comfortable life. But his one regret is that his affluence comes at a time when his brother is no longer able to enjoy his success.
"Unfortunately, my brother, I wasn't able to help," he states. "He passed away at a time where I didn't have a lot of money. But even though I wasn't making a lot of money, what I would make, we would definitely go out and buy whatever we could. I would buy him something. But I would've liked to have bought him a house or a car because he was my best friend. He was always with me and that hurts me that I can't do that right now."
Espinoza who first came into contact with Margarito in 1995, remembers that Margarito grew up in, "Very poor conditions, struggling to make a living." But unlike many others, Margarito was able to escape the pitfalls of that environment. Yet it wasn't boxing, but rather his family, that gave him the moral grounding that would guide him.
"Although I grew up around all the bad things that were happening in Tijuana, boxing wasn't an escape for me. My parents, they brought me up, they taught me right from wrong and they showed me which direction to go," he says. "It would be boxing (that kept me out of trouble). I started boxing at such a young age that I really can't tell you if it was or if it wasn't (the reason I did well with my life). But my parents had a lot to do with this."
His parents are now divorced. At a surprise birthday party on May 3rd in Tijuana, in what was a gala presentation put together by his wife, where hundreds of his friends and family gathered to celebrate his 30th year, the only melancholy moment of the night was when he addressed the audience and brought up his mother and father. The normally good-natured and amiable man would tear up as he addressed them.
While his family gave him a solid foundation, the sport in which he has dedicated his life to has helped ease the pain of the adversity that has come his way.
"Boxing has given me what I have right now. My home, it's given me fame, it's given me money, it's given me a beautiful life with my wife," Margarito says. "In regards to boxing, I've given it 100-percent. The day my father took me to the gym was the day I said, 'OK, if I'm going to get something out of boxing, I have to give to boxing as well.' My father told me, 'If you're going to do it, do it 100-percent.' Because I decided to leave school, I decided to drop out of school after the 8th grade. So I knew that I had to put everything into this to get something out of it."
Fighting Cotto, to him, is a great opportunity. But don't call it pressure - he's fought before in real pressure situations.
"I'm aware of the magnitude of the fight, I'm aware that this fight is very, very big. I'm not nervous. Anxious I am. I'm anxious for the day to come, I'm anxious to show the world who Antonio Margarito is. I'm anxious to get in the ring. But nervous, I'm not."
http://www.maxboxing.com/Kim/Kim072108.asp
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Originally Posted by LEGION
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