Hall of Fame Boxing Trainer Angelo Dundee answers your questions!

Dear Boxinginsider.com readers;

Excellent questions everyone! Thank you Boxinginsider.com readers for your participation. Hope you all enjoy reading what Mr. Dundee has to say.

Please keep your eye out for more of these Q&A sessions with boxing stars in the future. -Scoop Malinowski

Okay here’s the first question for Angelo Dundee…

Q - Angelo, pound for pound who is the best between Ray Leonard, Muhammad Ali, and Sugar Ray Robinson? You have trained two of them and I’m sure you’ve seen Robinson fight many times. And Angelo, if you had to fit Roy Jones into the pound for pound picture, where would you rank him?-Carl Sims

Angelo says: “Well you see, I explain it this way…You can’t connect anybody to Ali. Then you’re being unfair to people. Muhammad Ali changed the whole scenario. He was the first boxer to do all the talking in and out of the ring. Before Ali, the managers used to do the talking for the fighter. Ali changed all that. The first four years of Ali’s career, they thought I was a mute [laughs]! A lot of guys can fight in the ring but they can’t handle the stuff outside the ring. I think the newspaper guys made Ali sharp. Jimmy Cannon, Shirley Povich, all the great writers back then…they made Ali glib and sharp. He had to be…to deal with their questions. That’s why Muhammad Ali got better and better at it. He wasn’t that sharp as a kid. But he got much better as he went along.

I don’t like to do that (rate the all-time greats). It’s unfair. Each and every one of the boxers you named…they were the best of their time. The best. Hypothetically, Ray Robinson, how can you fault him? He was incredible. So was Jack Johnson.

Q - Do you think Roy Jones Jr. learned/gained heavyweight power in his fight with John Ruiz? -Robert Jackson

Angelo says: “Not really. He learned he can handle strength from a big guy. In other words, he offset him. I don’t think he looked to level him with his punches. If he tried to level him, he may have hurt his hands.

Q - Dear Mr.Dundee. I am currently preparing for my first amateur fight as a middleweight. in your opinion, what are the qualities of a successfull boxer? What does it take to become a champion? Dimitri from Greece

Angelo says: “I wish you luck in your first amateur boxing match! To be a champion, it takes so many qualities. You gotta persevere. You gotta train. You gotta abstain. You can’t be one of the bunch. You’ve got to really give it 100%. Just like in any profession. You graduate kindergarten, then grade school, then high school, you keep going up, up, up. Boxing is the same way. It’s a daily learning. When I go to the gyms now, I see some new things, some different things. It makes me feel good. The learning experience never stops.”

Q - Mr. Dundee. Suppose you had the chance to go back in time and train any great boxer of the past century (not just heavyweights) who would you choose and why? Thank you, George

Angelo says: “Willie Pep. ‘Cause I would have enjoyed myself every minute. Because he was such a great boxer. I had the fun experience of working with Eddie Machen. Sid Flaherty - his manager - asked me if I could give him a hand in his fight against Doug Jones in Miami Beach. After the 10th round, I gave him like a sermon, Let’s look good here, this round is important. And Machen says, Okay, Ang, I’ll try not to get knocked out! I enjoyed Eddie Machen. He had a great sense of humor.
Pep…oh I loved him. 1948…I had the pleasure of watching him in Madison Square Garden. The Sandy Saddler fights…such great fights. Pep had moves so smooth, such agility. Pep was like watching an artist. Like watching Fred Astaire dance. Pep was the kind of professional, he was kind to a lot of guys. He could have got them out of there. But he would go ten with a lot of guys. Those young kids would just try to knock him out and he’d absolutely frustrate them with his great boxing ability. He was beautiful to watch.”

Q - Greetings Mr. Dundee, it’s a great honor to have the chance for you to answer my question. Here it is: As a long-time boxing fan, I often wonder how Muhammad Ali would have fared against some of the other great heavyweights, particularly Joe Louis, Rocky Marciano, Mike Tyson, Lennox Lewis, Evander Holyfield, and Larry Holmes (had the two fought when both were in their prime). With the exception of Holmes, I think Ali would have dominated them all. He would have beaten Holmes but it would have been a tough, close fight. What do you think? Thanks so much, Tim Begany, Trumansburg, NY

Angelo Says: “Scoop you’ll like how I handle this [smiles]…he would have beat that style. But I’ll never say it about a fight. Rocky Marciano won the computer fight with Ali in America but lost in England. Machines make mistakes. So what does that tell you? I think Ali could play with Tyson’s style. He could keep him in the center of the ring, keep him turning and slap that style all over the ring. I don’t like to compare person to person. But style to style…you can get away with that.

There’s talk of adding a new super heavyweight division. I don’t see it. I think this era of big guys will pass on. Because they go into different fields of endeavor. After Lennox and the two (Klitschko) brothers, I think the heavyweight division will be back to normal, with normal size heavyweights. We have a ‘big’ evolution right now.”

Q - Dear Angelo, Can you please tell me anything about your former heavyweight Lee Canalito? I saw him fight once and I was very impressed….what happened?? Could he have been a top ten? I wanted to know the answer to these questions for a long time. Also, do you have a fansite? Thank you for your time. Jerry Giovinazzo, Tampa, FL

Angelo says: “What a nice kid that was. I felt bad. I screwed up. I made him go in a movie called Paradise Alley. He was 10-0, he was a genuine talent. I had him at the point, he just fought at Madison Square Garden. Sylvester Stallone called me up, (he said) I need a nice big kid for a movie. Lee could box for a big guy. I had fun with Lee. As a matter of fact, Lee just called me this week. We talked for a while. He has his gym in Texas. I felt he could have had a career as a heavyweight. He never lost. But he got in that Hollywood scene, did Paradise Alley. They wanted him to do a Tarzan movie but he couldn’t because he was too big.

(Could he have made Top 10?) Oh yeah. He was coming along. Like I say, it’s a different time today, guys are getting better and better. That kid we have Attila Levin won my KO (Saturday night) in Tampa. He just got back from a shoulder operation for bone spurs. He’s coming along very well. He’s working really hard, training like a dog, he ready to go. He’s 27, 6-foot-5, 240 and he’s agile. He’s ready to shoot.”

(Note: Angelo does have a website, it’s www.angelodundeeinc.com.)

Q - How do you see the Toney-Jirov fight playing out? And do you think Klitschko can come back from that loss to Corrie Sanders? Can he be champion again? Yevgeny, Russia

Angelo says: “That’s a helluva fight. That’s a murderer’s fight. That Jirov is some banger. He’s a great, great body puncher. I’ve never seen a better body puncher than Jirov. Toney is fighting better than ever now. But it might be too late. He’s in great shape now. It’s going to be a sensational fight. Toney’s a great guy, he’s happy now. I saw him a lot, making the Ali movie. He was smiling for a change. He used to be a miserable guy. Now he’s much happier. I got along with him famously. We - me and Michael Olajide - choreographed him, we had to make Frazier. It was a lot of fun.

(How about can Wladimir Klitschko come back from his devastating loss to Corrie Sanders and be champion again?) “You could throw out the window most first-round knockout losses. If you go out cold, you’re not ready, it means you didn’t warm-up properly…if you get nailed in that first round, your body doesn’t react as well as if it’s warmed up. You had a guy like Emile Griffith (former Welterweight and Middleweight champion) knocked out in a round (by Ruben “Hurricane” Carter in 1963 at the age of 26). It never happened (to Griffith) again. It’s a lesson learned. It’s a tough lesson learned if you get hit on the chin like that. You know what the old axiom is: ‘Don’t take no fight cheap.’ I don’t know what actually happened there in Germany, I wasn’t there. I don’t know if he was warmed up properly. I don’t know if his mind was really on the fight, with all those anthems. I think he can comeback, yes. He didn’t get seriously hurt. He didn’t take no physical beating. He didn’t take no shellacking. He can comeback and be a wiser, smarter fighter.”