AN EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH ZAB JUDAH
By Elisa Harrison
|
AN EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH ZAB JUDAH By Elisa Harrison |
|
|
Preceded by an impressive 27-0, 21 KO's record, IBF Junior Welterweight Champion Zab Judah will soon meet the man that holds the other divisional hardware, WBC and WBA Champion Konstantin Tszyu, Kostya to most, on November 3rd, at the MGM Grand Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.
To Judah this bout represents his chance at boxing history as a 23 year old undisputed champion
of the world. Kostya Tszyu is the man that stands in the way of Judah's achievement. Thus is
the scenario for this match up; the only thing missing are the round card girls and the
fireworks that will surely go off when these two meet in the square circle.
We met up with Zab in West Palm Beach, where we watched him train and from where we conducted
this interview. This is what we talked about.
ZAB: I can't wait, I have 28 more days. I've been in camp for
about 4 weeks now, training in West Palm Beach. We will be leaving for Vegas this coming weekend.
ZAB: It's going to be a good fight, but at the end of the night
Zab Judah is going to be standing undisputed champion of the world.
ZAB: You have to understand that it goes back with me and Sharmba Mitchell. He was offered a chance
to fight me, and Kostya was to fight Reggie Green, because Reggie was ranked #1 in the world.
They gave Mitchell the chance to fight me, but he said no, he chose to fight Kostya Tszyu because
he felt that Tszyu's style would be easier for him. He could have fought me, we could have fought.
Ask anybody in the sport of boxing, they'll tell you I ducks no one. Anyone of my fights, I
never had the chance to pick him over him, or him; never, I never had that chance.
When I was 15-0 I was calling out a world champion, I mean, I was calling him out, come on, let's
fight. That's just the way I was raised; my confidence comes from my training. The way I train,
that's what gives me confidence. I know every time I step in the ring or get close to a fight,
I've done my homework here in the gym. I put in all my hard work; so when I step in the ring,
I don't fear nothing, because mentally and physically, there is nothing you can do to me. You
are not faster than me, you don't hit harder than me, you're not smarter than me, I mean, I'm
just ready.
ZAB: Mike is like my big brother. We sit and we talk, oh my God, we talk about everything. Life,
all kinda stuff, me and Mike are very close. I remember the times when Mike wouldn't talk to
anybody but me. I respect him a lot. A lot of the stuff that people in the outside world see of
him, how they label or stereotype him, he is not that type of person. I've been around him
all day and I don't see it, you know what I'm saying? I don't see it.
Me and Vargas, we're around the same age, we knew each other when we didn't have anything, as
amateurs. I had nothing, he had nothing, we go back a long ways. If we see each
other now, we more or less, we compare cars, houses, stuff like that. It's all good stuff, you
know what I mean? It's all like that.
ZAB: You know, I think that mentally the Tito fight messes with him. I feel like it had a mental
stress on him. He used to be more vicious, more aggressive. Now, he is kinda like, he has taken
it back two notches and relaxed a little bit, and went into a different type of mode.
ZAB: It depends on him; right now his mental is on something else, right now he is not thinking
the same way he thought before he fought Tito, he is thinking a whole 'nother way now. I mean,
who knows if he is to come back and be that same "Ferocious" Fernando Vargas again. He's
still hungry, he's champion of the world again, maybe this might spark him up, put all
that fire underneath him again. I wish him all the best. I wish that he do come back and be that
same Vargas again.
I was at that fight (the Trinidad fight) and I feel that he should never have to hold his head
down towards that fight; that was a great fight! He put on a warrior's
fight; a lot of fighters wouldn't have even made it that far, and I give it to him for that. He
is an excellent fighter, he went twelve rounds with Tito and you have to give him that.
ZAB: It started when I was fifteen years old. I fought in the Golden Gloves in New York
City. It's a world wide tournament, I won it easily; it came on TV, and a lot of
big people seen it. So, you know, I was home, and Lou Duva called my house. I picked up the
phone and he was like, this is Lou Duva, and I was like, Lou Duva the manager? Wow! I mean, I
was like fifteen then, and Lou Duva said that Pernell Whitaker wanted me to come to his camp to
spar with him, I'm like, ME?? PERNELL?? What the hell can I do for Pernell???
So, I hung up the phone on him the first time he called, because I said somebody is playing
games on the phone. He called back and said, really, this is Lou Duva, this is Lou Duva. I
was like, yeah, alright, you gotta call back when my father is home. So he called back, and him
and my father set everything up. I went down to the camp in Norfolk/Virginia Beach, Arturo
Gatti was there, Ivan Robinson, Eddie Hopson, a lot of big fighters, so when I got there I was
like, Wow! It was funny because these guys had seen me fight already, they knew who I was,
and I was shocked-like. Damn! These people know me!?!?
I got there at night, all night I was like, where is Whitaker? And they would say, he is around.
So I'm walking around the hotel all night, cool, cool, cool; I stayed up all night, looking
around the lobby of the hotel see if I could see him. But, I didn't get to see him that night,
I eventually went to bed and the next morning met up with Ronnie Shields and the rest of the
staff in the lobby. Everybody was waiting for Pernell Whitaker, and here he comes! I was like,
Oh no!!! I mean, I was fifteen years old; I was shocked, here goes my idol, Pernell Whitaker.
I was like, WOW! He is right here!
So, we went to the gym, we're loosening up, and Ronnie goes 'Zab, you are
boxing today'. Okay, who am I boxing with? 'Pernell Whitaker', he answers. I'm like, WHAT??
PERNELL WHITAKER??? Okay, okay, cool, so I said, alright, and I'm like Whitaker, Whitaker, this
is a legend right here. So, I go like, alright, cool, no problem. I start to shadow box, I'm
nervous, and I'm like I'm with Pernell Whitaker, and the more I look at him the more I'm going
Whitaker, Whitaker. So we get in the ring, we start moving around, and I'm saying, dang, this is
Pernell Whitaker, what should I do? Should I try to go hard? Or should I...? I mean, I didn't
know what to do. I'm still confused, basically just jabbing out there, but really not touching
nothing, just jabbing, hitting air; but I'm trying to show that I'm in there. And out of nowhere,
he hit me, BANG! He clocked me, I was like, oh wow! Ok, cool, so I looked at my father, he
looked at me and shrugged his shoulders you know, as if to say, hey, you gotta do what you
gotta do, that's what you're here for. So I said, cool, and I zoned out, I didn't look at him
as Pernell Whitaker no more; I looked at him as a regular guy and we just went at it. After it was
all over, everybody was just shocked. His mother was there, Lou was there; Lou was like, we got
a Pernell Whitaker all over again, a Pernell Whitaker with a punch. Even his mother came over and
said: 'Oh my God, I've never seen anyone fight like my son. I've never seen anyone do the things
that he does, and do them as well as he does'.
After the sparring Whitaker didn't say anything to me, just 'good work'. I said cool, I went in
there and I did my best. So we're getting ready to leave the gym to go back to the hotel, and
Whitaker says 'you come ride with me'...I was shocked, I said oh man! What did I do? I did
something wrong?? Pernell had a black Mercedes Benz at the time, I was like WOW!!! you know,
and he took me to the mall, took me shopping; he still hadn't said anything, we were just
shopping, and he said 'just get what you want'. I was like, get what I want? Ahh, nah, I'm
okay, I don't want nothing; and he says 'Come on man! get what you want, get something, get
something'. Well, I started to pick out some things, and he got me a whole bunch of stuff, and
I was shocked.
Then we got in the car, on our way back, and he said 'You know something? I see you have a lot
of potential, you're going to be a great fighter. All you have to do is keep your head on right,
work hard. You are destined to be a world champ'. I couldn't believe it, I mean, coming from
HIM?? So, I said, thank you, and he said he wanted to take me under his wing, he said he wanted me
to watch and learn. He said 'I'm going to tell you from day one, Rule #1, don't talk. Don't talk
so much, don't say nothing. Just listen, watch, be very observant; just watch, watch, watch'. So,
from that day, whenever I trained, I just watched, watched, watched, never talked, and I just
learned. I took what he had and I put it to my style, then a couple of years later I got with
Tyson.
You know, it was crazy, 'cause Mike told me the same damn thing. He said 'Zab, just watch'. He
took me to his house, he took me shopping, just like a brother. It was crazy, first Whitaker and
now Mike. They both gave me the same advise, watch and learn. They both said you have potential
to be the best fighter out there, and I always take that in the room with me. It was the experience of
a lifetime. I was with Whitaker for years, we sparred over 150 rounds; we hung, I went to his
house, I stayed with his family. It meant a lot to me, to this day, and it means a lot to me to
be going up to fight for my undisputed championship of the world; when I met him, he was the
undisputed champion of the world, you know what I mean? It's just great, and for Mike Tyson,
another good friend of mine, being undisputed champion of the world...Whitaker, Tyson, both of
them, they did what I'm trying to accomplish and they told me, and I can always remember them
telling me, some day your turn is gonna come. Like Whitaker said, everybody gets a chance, and
when your chance comes around, it's what you do with it. Are you going to work hard to be great with it
or are you going to let the opportunity slide right by? I made up my mind that I'm going to take
mine and run with it.
ZAB: Yeah, well, you know, the thing with that, it's not for me to judge Pernell in his personal
life. As far as what he did for the sport of boxing, he was great. One thing I respect about him
and when I talked with him, and we talked for hours, and I was hurt, and I asked him, I said,
Why? and he said 'You know something? I don't even know; but one thing I always said to myself
was I want to fulfill my career first'. So, the one thing I respect about him, not saying that
I'm encouraging anybody to do anything; I totally disagree with it but, he did his career first;
and when it was all over, he went, and he did his problem and stuff like that. That's what he
chose to do with his life, I don't condone it or anything like that. But while he was in the
sport, I respect him 'cause he did a lot for the sport. He was known as one of the best fighters
pound for pound in the world, when he was at the top of his game, he was the illest. What he
did in his personal life, after it was all over, that's him, that's what he wanted to do.
ZAB: I feel very proud about that because I'm the next Pernell Whitaker while he was pound for
pound the best fighter in the world; not the Pernell Whitaker after his career was over. It's
not for me to judge the man; I wasn't with him for his personal life, I was with him for the
boxing part of his life, so I can't judge him for what he did in his spare time. He never brought
it around me, or to me, or anything to that extent, so I can't judge him for that.
ZAB: It's funny you know, people call me that, I guess because I'm in the hip hop world, and I
just started my own record label plus I hang around with a lot of rappers, entertainers, things
of that sort. A lot of us come from the same background, like me and Jay Z, rest in peace Biggie,
when he was alive, Lil Kim, Foxxy Brown, Shyne. In my spare time, that's what I do, I'm in the
music world, I'm in all the hip hop parties, so people categorize me as, he is a champion, so
he is a hip hop champion. You know, there is a big following into hip hop; a lot of people's
life style has been risen on hip hop; a lot of kids, such as myself have been risen on hip
hop; so a lot of kids look at Zab Judah, the hip hop champion, with the boxing, and what he's
doing for the sport of boxing, but he is also into hip hop. I also got another crowd from the
hip hop world and now I got them into boxing.
Some kids know me more from the hip hop than from the boxing, and that means a lot. I wanna let
all young kids know from me coming from the ghetto, that there is a way out. It's sad to see
that a lot of these kids living in there feel like there's no way out, what they have now
is what they're gonna have for the rest of their lives. They feel like, for me to get older, drop
out of school, go get a kid coke and stand in the corner and sell it, know what I'm saying? Or
give me a gun, get some colors and become a gang banger. That's not cool. And I just like to
go back and show them I came from the same place you came from, all this I got you can have it
too, but it just takes hard work and dedication.
I have block parties for the kids, we got a day in Brooklyn called "Zab Judah Day". We have a
big cookout in the summer, I bring rides out for the kids, it's just crazy. We have a lot of
fun, we have music and I get a lot of entertainers to come out, I get a lot of rappers to come
out and show love; you know, just to show kids that there is a brighter side on the other side
this is only not what the ghetto got to offer, there is more. You can take all this negative
energy and turn it into a positive, which is exactly what I did. I have a big piece coming out
November 22nd in Sports Illustrated, I got the cover, it's just showing my lifestyle, and now
we're coming out with a mini version movie of my life story, because as a kid, I'm not going to
say I was a perfect kid, I got in trouble in school, got suspended, got kicked out of a couple
of schools...
ZAB: Fighting, it was always about fighting. I loved to fight. It was the ego, if I wasn't the
main kid that was on top, then whoever the main kid was, I would beat him up. You know that
everywhere you go there is always somebody that is looked at as the bigger person, so if I went
to a school and there was this one kid that everybody respected as "Big Joe", you know I would be
like, WHAT? I'll knock him out, just to show everybody I'm running this school; which I learned
that wasn't the right thing to do in school, but that was just my ego. So, I go back to schools
and let the kids know, don't let your ego so much get in front of you and try to override you,
to block out the school knowledge, like me. I had to stop going to school for a minute 'cause
I had to go to the Olympics, but after that, I went back and got my high school diploma. My
father told me, I don't care what you're doing, stop it and go back to school, even if you
don't go to college, just get that. It means a lot out here in the world, just to know
basics in life, and I had to go back and do it. So, I always go back to tell kids no matter
what you do, even if you don't like school, you don't like college, get your high school
diploma, get a GED, just do that, and after that, you are going to live life a little bit
differently.
After I did it, I said let me look into other things now, let me go ahead and do
Zab Judah Promotions; we're coming out with a clothing line, Judah Wear, it's hip hop, urban
wear. I got a guy and a girl's line, and it will be coming out by the end of this year or early
next year. People relate to me as a hip hop champion because I don't really relate back to boxing
in my free time, they say I always do everything else hip hop, street, so that's street. I take
what I can from the boxing and use it to my advantage, and put it into another life style. I
don't plan on boxing for the rest of my life. I am 22 years old, almost 23, by 27 or 28 I'm
looking to be done with this boxing game. I've been looking to put my hands into all kinds of
other aspects, so when I'm done with boxing, I won't have to look back and go, you know I used
to be champion of the world but now I'm broke...
~~~~~~
I watched Judah spar with a young man named Yuri Forman; I was in awe of Zab's speed, his
lightening quick reflexes and his intelligence in the ring, the capacity to quickly adapt to
his foe's style. I noticed his brother Daniel seated quietly in one corner of the ring while
Dad Yoel shouted instructions from the other side. The Judahs are a tight knit family, very
supportive and respectful of each other.
Funny, as I was transcribing this interview, I though about Max Kellerman and the unabashed
affection that he displays for Zab Judah. I understand it better now. Judah is a very
charismatic, talented young man, with an infectious smile and undeniably superior boxing skills.
Watching him tell the story about Lou Duva's phone call and "Sweet Pea" Whitaker in training
camp, was like watching a four year old opening up presents on Christmas Day. For all the
ghetto tough talk, I discerned something very pristine in his delivery, and quite frankly, I was
impressed with the aplomb, the warmth and maturity that he displayed.
|
