WRIGHT VS. QUARTEY: NOW OR NEVER

by Ron Borges

Ike Quartey and Winky Wright will be facing each other Dec. 2 because they have no other choice. For boxing fans, that's usually the best of reasons.

Quartey is coming off a controversial loss to Vernon Forrest that was roundly booed by the crowd at Madison Square Garden earlier this year while Wright is in with the 36-year-old former welterweight champion in part because of an equally debatable draw with middleweight champion Jermain Taylor in his last outing. Those outcomes left both of them with limited options and without the kind of leverage they needed to force bigger fights against more reluctant opponents and so they finally agreed to disagree quite literally - on Dec. 2 in a card rightly nicknamed "The Heat is On.''

It is for both of them but for different reasons. At 36, Quartey can ill-afford a second straight defeat, questionable or not, if his comeback from a five-year layoff is to bring him closer to the big fight he's been chasing most of his career. At 34, Wright has an enviable resume and a firm belief that he is still the best fighter pound-for-pound in the world but after a rusty performance in beating Sam Soliman and the draw with Taylor he, too, has reached the point where defeat is no longer so easily to overcome. So for each of them much is at stake in a fight neither was anticipating when this process all began.

For a time Wright flirted with the possibility of facing Taylor in an immediate rematch but that, frankly, was never going to happen because Taylor was coming off three straight taxing fights, two with Bernard Hopkins and the one with Wright, and wanted what he perceived to be a less formidable opponent next. Taylor and the people around him well understood Wright's options and believed he is not likely to find anyone else with whom he could make more money in the immediate future so they simply priced the fight out of existence, an old trick in boxing.

Since Wright not only didn't lose to Taylor but firmly believes he won, he was willing to take the short end of the money but not as short as was proposed for a December rematch even though that ultimately meant he'd have to take even less money to face a dangerous, though aging, Quartey. In the end that was fine with Wright because anyone they put in front of him is fine with Wright.

"He's a great fighter but I just think I'm a better fighter all the way around,'' Wright said of Quartey. "Ike's got one way of fighting. I can box or I can fight that way (brawling). I'm trying to beat anybody they put in front of me. Whoever the fans want to see Winky Wright fight I'll fight.

I duck no one and I never have. I don't feel Ike Quartey is strong enough to war with me. I'm going in to demonstrate to the fans why people been ducking me for so long.''

In the end, Taylor got what he wanted, a good payday in his hometown to face undersized former junior middleweight champion Kassim Ouma, a busy fighter facing a distinct size disadvantage on Dec. 9 when he comes to Little Rock, Ark. Wright got a decent payday in his own hometown as well for settling on Quartey. What Quartey got was what he's grown to expect from boxing...which is something less than he believes he deserved.

Quartey walked away from the sport for five years after losing a disputed decision to Fernando Vargas in a fight for the IBF 154-pound championship in large part because it came on the heels of losing an even more controversial split decision to Oscar De La Hoya that cost him his version of the welterweight championship in his previous fight. Those two dark nights were the last things Quartey wanted to see from boxing and so he returned to Accra, the capital of Ghana, to open what has reportedly become a highly successful construction and real estate business.

Fittingly for a fighter, his latest project is building a hospital, a place where Quartey has sent many of his 41 opponents (37-3, 31 KO) over the years, but not even that was not enough to keep him out of the ring. He returned with renewed interest 18 months ago and won three straight fights as a junior middleweight before losing a decision to Forrest in which two of the three judges had them separated by only a single point and the fans had him well ahead and let everyone know it. That changed nothing in his mind however so not surprisingly his first thought was a return to Ghana and to retirement. But this time Quartey oddly found his phone ringing more often with proposals than he expected and so, after some pleading by promoter Lou DiBella, he agreed to stay on for a while.

The first name in play was Sergio Mora of "The Contender'' fame but those talks dissipated quickly and so he was left staring at an opponent many in boxing still believe may be the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world even though, at 34, Winky Wright's own skills may have begun to slip.

Slippage by both of them is part of what makes this engagement intriguing however. Each may not quite be all that he once was but they both remain formidable enough that the outcome could become explosively destructive. Wright, for one, expects Quartey to come out in his usual hard-punching fashion, throwing every blow with concussive intentions. That is not Wright's game but, if Quartey chooses to play it the former junior middleweight champion says it will only make his night's work easier.

"I don't see him stronger than me,'' Wright said. "I know 100 per cent he can't knock me out. If he's coming for that he'll get himself hurt.'' With Wright-Taylor priced out and Ouma not a factor for him, a man who spent most of his career fighting on four continents and in everyone else's backyard until he finally got his chance late in his boxing life and responded by beating Shane Mosely twice, dismantling Felix Trindad next and then easily out boxing Soliman before his draw with Taylor found himself again chasing fighters reluctant to accept his challenge. Though difficult for Wright, that was a fortunate occurrence for the people who pay the bills in boxing - the fans - because it landed him in the same ring with Quartey in a showdown between two highly motivated, highly skilled and highly desperate opponents.

"You do not want to overlook an opponent as dangerous as Ike Quartey,'' says Richard Schaeffer, CEO of Golden Boy Promotions, who is promoting the bout for Wright. "It is do-or-die for Ike Quartey. Quartey feels he got the short end of the stick in the past so this is his opportunity. But Winky knows what's on the line for him. This is his chance after the poor performance from Floyd Mayweather (in beating Carlos Baldomir) and the explosive one by Manny Pacquiao (in stopping Erik Morales) to show he's still the pound-for-pound No. 1 guy.''

Given his druthers however, Wright would rather be fighting the promoter of this match, Oscar De La Hoya, than his opponent but that was not possible for several reasons, the biggest being Mayweather. When he and De La Hoya meet next May they will likely shatter every pay-per-view record ever set in boxing, something not even Wright would argue was likely if De La Hoya and he met so he moved on to accept what he claims is a unique challenge.

"They still ducking me,'' Wright (50-3-1, 25 KO) said recently when asked how he ended up in with the heavy-handed Quartey. "Only Ike wanted to fight me.''

As has happened so often to one of the most skilled performers in the sport, Wright's fate was in the hands of others and when they dealt out the cards they dealt in Quartey, who, strangely, is in the same boat as well as the same ring as Wright. Both know to get the mega fight they crave will not be easy because for the one who looks good it will be further evidence to others that he should be avoided and for the one who loses it will make them more difficult to market. What that means for fight fans is the presence of two desperate guys who know they are in a dangerous fight in which they cannot play it safe. They must go all out to win because losing is not an option available to either of them at their ages. "I have to treat every fight like a mega-fight but it's hard,''

Quartey admitted after agreeing to the fight. "There's no such thing as an easy fight for me but it's hard to get up for this kind of fight.''

Quartey is not questioning the 34-year-old Wright's skills when he says that. What he's referring to is that it's a hard battle that involves great risk but not the kind of one that brings the financial reward he was hoping for when he launched his comeback. Such is the harsh reality faced by men like Wright and Quartey, men with superior skills and impressive records but neither a world title nor superior enough drawing power to force anyone to face them against their will. Excluding each other, of course.

Wright admits he was lucky that Mosley was willing to give him a chance two years ago against the advice of his then promoter Gary Shaw, who felt quite rightly it was stylistically a terrible match for Mosley. Had Mosley not done that what followed might not have been possible but after Wright twice proved the wisdom of Shaw's assessment he still needed some luck to land Trinidad, who apparently never thought the long-time 154-pound champion could stand up to his firepower. He not only did that he gave Trinidad a painful lesson in the art of self-defense, winning every round on one judge's card and 11 of 12 on the other two.

Those victories confirmed what many had long felt about Wright, that he was among the very best boxers in the world. Problem with that is his style is one in which his offense works off his defense, which is intriguing for aficionados but for the less astute fight fan it is too often seen as boring. More than a few observers felt that's what the Taylor-Wright fight was - a somewhat boring clinic in which the decision went to the wrong guy.

Whatever the cause, the result was a need to face a dangerous opponent with knockout power and to look good doing it to keep his own name and face at the forefront of a sport filled with opponents who just wish Winky Wright would go away.

"I'm focused first and foremost on Ike Quartey,'' Wright said from his training camp in Las Vegas. "Everybody you get into the ring with is dangerous. i see myself being a professional and handling my business on Dec. 2.

"This will be a different kind of fight than Jermain. That fight I was pressing him. He was only fighting to keep me off him. He wasn't fighting to win. Ike will bring it. I don't know if this is a crossroads fight. They can call it what they want. I just want to prove I'm still one of the best fighters in the world. I want to show I can dominate a once great champion.

"I'm fighting everyone they put in front of me. I duck no one. Everything I did came the hard way. Jermain I beat in his home town. Now he doesn't want to fight me again. Ike is the only guy who would fight me. I'll do everything it takes to win. He better be ready to do the same thing. I'm not someone who's past tense.''

Ike Quartey is out to prove the same thing. Two fighters, both trying to show the boxing world they are not "past tense.'' One of them will succeed. Where that leaves the other is what will give Dec. 2 a hard edge.

It is what will provide the tension as the days wind down. Two fighters who can ill afford to lose and who both believe they never have will square off. Only one of them will still be right after it's over but both of them will be changed men. One for the better the other for the worst.