Fighting Words

The most-interesting boxing quotes of all time


"I'll fight Lloyd Honeyghan
 for nothing,
 if the price is right."
-- Marlon Starling
 "When we started,
 (boxing's rating system)
was based on lies.
 It's changing now.
 You've got to come with the truth,
 the whole truth,
and nothing but the truth.
 It's become very confusing."
-- promoter Don King

 "This boxer is doing what is expected of him
... bleeding from his nose."
-- broadcaster Harry Carpenter

"I was in a no-win situation
... so I'm glad I won."
-- Frank Bruno
"On what?"
-- Chris Eubank, asked if he
had considered writing an autobiography
"To me, boxing is like a ballet
... except there's no music
and the dancers hit each other."
-- Jack Handy

 




"I've got it made. I've got a wife, and a TV set,
and they're both working."
-- Willie Pep

 


"Sure, as long as he ties
a 56-pound weight to each leg."
-- Brian London,
asked if he would consider
 fighting Muhammad Ali again.
 "Screw things up in tennis and it's 15-love.
Screw things up in boxing,
 it's your ass."
-- Randall "Tex" Cobb
 "I was called 'Rembrandt' Hope
during my boxing days
because I spent so much time
on the canvas."
-- comedian Bob Hope

"If you think (Iran) Barkley
was mad after the fight,
 wait till he finds out
how many people
are taking part of his purse."
-- promoter Bob Arum
"I don't know what impressive is,
but Joe was impressive tonight."
-- Joe Bugner's wife, Marlene.
"My main objective is
to be professional,
but to kill him."
-- Mike Tyson, on Lennox Lewis





"Howard Cosell was considering a boxing career,
but they couldn't find
a mouthpiece that was big enough."
-- Muhammad Ali



"He looks up through
 blood-smeared lips."
-- broadcaster Harry Carpenter
 "The referee is the most-important
man in the ring,
besides the two fighters."
-- George Foreman
 "Superman don't need no plane."
-- Flight attendant, after Muhammad Ali
told her, "Superman don't need
no seat belt"

"I'm gonna eat every flavor
at Baskin-Robbins,
so when he's pushin' me,
 he'll be pushing a whole franchise."
-- George Foreman
"Tell him he can have my title,
but I want it back in the morning."
-- Jack Dempsey, challenged by
a drunk
"Honey, I forgot to duck."
-- Jack Dempsey to his wife
after losing the heavyweight title






"When I looked up, the count was five
... and I said, 'Damn, what happened
to one through four?"
-- Buster Mathis Jr., after being
KO'd by Mike Tyson



"I fought Sugar Ray so many times,
I'm surprised I'm not diabetic."
-- Jake LaMotta
 "Everybody's got plans
until they get hit."
-- Mike Tyson
 "Yeah, I"m scared ...
I'm scared I might kill Schmeling"
-- Joe Louis"

"Joe Frazier's so ugly,
he should donate his face
to the U.S. Bureau of  Wildlife."
-- Muhammad Ali
"It's just a job.
Grass grows, birds fly, waves pound the sand
... I beat people up."
-- Muhammad Ali
"Well, madam, boxing is my excuse.
What's yours?"
-- Henry Cooper, to a baroness
who commented on his
crooked nose






"Ain't never hoid of him. Must be
one of them foreign heavyweights.
They're all lousy.
Sure as hell, I'll moider da bum."
-- "Two-Ton" Tony Galento on Shakespeare


"Why would anyone expect him
to come out smarter?
He went to prison,
not Princeton."
-- promoter Don King,
on Mike Tyson
 "You've got a guy who wants
to eat your children
fighting a guy
who wants to stop you from having any."
-- sports talk host Jim Rome
on Tyson-Golota
 "You always say, 'I'll quit
when I start to slide.'
Then you wake up one morning
and realize you done slid."
-- Sugar Ray Robinson"

"Sure, the fight was fixed.
I fixed it with my right hand."
-- George Foreman,
after his 1994 KO of Michael Moorer
"George Foreman can knock down
an oak tree
... but oak trees don't move."
-- Angelo Dundee
"I want to keep fighting because
it's the only thing that keeps me
out of the hamburger joints.
If I don't fight, I'll eat this planet."
-- George Foreman





"Bob Arum is one of the worst people
in the western hemisphere. I don't know the eastern hemisphere very well,
but I suspect he'd be one of the
worst people there, too."
-- Trainer Cus D'Amato



"Frank Bruno figures to be
the biggest British disaster
since the Titanic."
-- columnist Jim Murray,
on the Tyson-Bruno fight
 "Mike Tyson's not so bad
if you dig real deep.
If you dig all the way to China,
I'm sure you'll find
that there's a nice guy in there."
-- George Foreman
 "They say they picked Justin Fortune
because he's the same height
as Mike Tyson. So is my wife."
-- Columnist Hugh McIlvanney
on a less-than-daunting Lennox Lewis foe"

"Mike's like a Beethoven or a Gershwin.
You go for the quality
of the performance,
not for the longevity."
-- Jose Torres, on the brevity
of Tyson's early fights
"He has a better chance
of starring in the next Wonderbra commercial
than of winning the heavyweight championship."
-- columnist Richard Williams,
on Buster Mathis Jr.
"I want to keep fighting because
it's the only thing that keeps me
out of the hamburger joints.
If I don't fight, I'll eat this planet."
-- George Foreman





"Congratulations! Whose baby is it?"
-- Joe Frazier, after Ken Norton
announced that his wife just had a baby


"A lot of promoters
couldn't match their cheeks
with their buttocks."
-- Mickey Duff
 "Frank Bruno has a chin
of pure Waterford crystal.
It gives rise to the adage,
"People with glass jaws
shouldn't throw punches."
-- Columnist Jim Murray
"Anyone who studied Oliver McCall's
contribution to the fight
would not have been surprised
 to learn
that he failed to hit
the (drug testing) tube with
the required amount afterwards."
-- Columnist Peter Corrigan"

"I can close any
cut in the world in 50 seconds,
as long as it ain't
a total beheading."
-- Cutman Adolph Ritacco
"I'll have two stools in the corner:
One for Vinnie (Pazienza) to sit on,
the other to throw at him
if he don't listen to me."
-- Trainer Lou Duva
"Sports is business. It's nothing new.
Kid Cain would not have
put his title on the line
against Boy Able
if the money hadn't been right."
-- Columnist Frank Keating




"What's the sense of bein' Irish
if you can't be stupid?"
-- Billy Conn