Chapter 13 : State Championship

"Link, isn't this too high-profile? If your opponents notice, they will study your playing style, and your next game will become more difficult."  

In the office on the third floor of the boxing gym, West looked through the match records and said with some concern.

  Link won all three matches by KOing his opponents and his performance was extremely outstanding. After the regional competition, many people in the Miami boxing circle paid attention to him.

This attention might be well-intentioned, but it would never lack malice. For the purpose of protecting Link, West decided to talk to Link.

"It doesn't matter. If you want to be famous, you have to pay a price. I'm not afraid of being targeted."

  Link shook his head. He did this just to attract other people's attention.

  Now is the Internet age, with the development of information and communication technology, the public can use the Internet to collect information from various platforms for free, which also makes it easy for the public's vision and attention to be distracted.

  Like in the Ali era and the Tyson era, they were able to gain extremely high attention among the people and become popular boxing champions just by relying on newspapers and television news.

Their matches are also sought after by boxing fans, and they receive extremely high ticket sales and PPV (pay per view) revenue shares, with each match earning tens to hundreds of millions of US dollars.

Ten million US dollars in the 1960s and 1970s is comparable to 40 to 50 million US dollars in 2008.

  Now if he wants to become a popular boxing champion like Ali, Tyson, and Holyfield and earn more US dollars, he must become famous and find ways to gain more attention and discussion.

  One of the solutions he thought of was to kill the opponent as quickly as possible in the game and show his strong strength.

"West, if there is an interview with the media, please keep it secret for now and leave some suspense for the media and the public. When it is exposed in the finals, it will gain more attention and become a hot topic."

Link said after thinking for a while.

  West nodded. He had been in the boxing world for thirty or forty years and knew a lot about the boxing circle. He could also understand Link's approach and purpose.

  There was no doubt that Link was right.

This also reminded him of when he debuted. His agent asked reporters to interview him and write press releases for him. He was reluctant to do so because he believed that boxers were not actors or singers and that boxers should speak with their fists rather than useless fame.

  I was really too young back then, and my ideas were too immature. In the boxing world, fame is not only useful, but also crucial.

  Suppose two boxers have the same strength but different fame. The more famous one gets a prize of 10 million US dollars for each match, while the less famous one gets an appearance fee of 10,000 US dollars for each match.

For the bonus, the strength they burst out in the boxing ring is definitely different, and the more famous ones will definitely perform better than usual.

  That year, he fought against WBO middleweight champion Sugar Ray Leonard as a challenger. When the game started, tens of thousands of people in the audience cheered Sugar's name and cheered for him.

Sugar easily gained the home advantage, but he played under pressure and finally performed poorly and lost to Sugar.

  When he got older, West often thought about the past, and thought about the games he played at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. If there were tens of thousands of people cheering for him back then, could he have won?

He felt that he had a good chance, at least he would not be knocked out by Sugar in the third round.

  So now that he sees that Link knows how to use the media, create public opinion, promote himself and attract public attention at the beginning of his debut, he feels very gratified.

  "Link, just focus on the game. I'll let Robinson take care of the media matters. He was my assistant and executive agent back then and often dealt with the media. These matters won't be difficult for him."

  "good!"

  ——

The Golden Gloves Championship schedule was very tight. Just one day after the regional competition, Link, West, Mario, Reggie and others took the Silver Star train to Orlando to participate in the Golden Gloves State Championship qualifiers.

  Orlando is located in central Florida, more than 230 miles away from Miami. It is also a scenic tourist city. The more famous tourist attractions in the city include Walt Disney World, Universal Studios, and Islands of Adventure.

  This is also one of the filming locations of "Harry Potter". In Adventure Island, there is the Magical World of Harry Potter, Hogwarts Castle, Hogsmeade Village, Magic Train and other tourist projects, which are more suitable for family travel.

Orlando is most famous for the Orlando Magic, one of the NBA professional basketball teams.

  The Magic's performance this year was average. Although they had the "Superman" Dwight Howard, Turkish power forward Hidayat Turkoglu, and one of the "twin stars" Rashard Lewis, they still lost to the Detroit Pistons in the divisional competition. They packed up and went home early, leaving the stadium to the boxers to compete.

  The Florida qualifiers for the Golden Gloves Championship are held at the Amway Arena, the home arena of the Orlando Magic.

This stadium can accommodate 17,000 spectators. The game will also be open to the public. People can enter by buying tickets. The ticket price for out-of-town tourists is $15 each, which is not expensive.

  "Hey, you know, I was a member of the school basketball team when I was in junior high school, and I was pretty good at it."

  In the lounge of the Amway Arena, Mario said while looking at the Magic team logo on the wall.

  "Why don't you continue playing basketball? You can play guard with your height."

"Do you think I didn't want to? I grew to 6 feet 15 at the age of 18 and then stopped growing taller. I became fatter and fatter. Later, I met West, and he said I was suitable for boxing, so I came here to practice boxing."

Mario said, hugging the fat on his belly.

  Link was also a little surprised when he saw him. This guy doesn't lose weight even after training every day. He was 208 pounds before and now he is 210 pounds. The meat on his body is not pure fat, but a mixture of fat and lean. It is much firmer than James's and can withstand a lot of beatings.

  "I wanted to play baseball," Reggie said, scratching his blond hair. "Then I watched Tyson's game and thought boxing was cooler, so I started boxing."

"Link, what about you?" Mario asked.

  Link thought about it and realized that he was originally a miner, and being a boxer was no better choice.

  Although being a boxer is hard and tiring, hitting sandbags with fists every day, or being beaten as a sparring partner, it is obviously more hopeful than working in a dark mine.

  When I was in the mine, I went down the well in fear every day, and drilled into a pit hundreds of meters deep. Looking at the mine above my head, I couldn't help but worry about being hit to death by a falling rock, or being buried deep in the mine in a mining accident. Even my body would not be found, and my family would not get any compensation.  

Those days were truly dark.

  For him, boxing was more like a ray of light shining into his dark life, a life-saving straw, so he never gave up until his death.

  "Link?"

  "I'm a diver. I have a diving license."

  Link laughed.

  "Cool! I'm going to dive with you after the game."

  When the group walked into the Amway Arena, the state championship had already been held for half a day.

The scene was divided into two match points. The left ring was for competitions above 70 kg, and the right ring was for competitions below 70 kg.

There were more than 2,000 spectators at the event and the atmosphere was quite lively.

  Currently, a heavyweight (over 91 kg) boxing match is taking place on the left ring. Two fat athletes are fighting on the stage wearing boxing gloves and protective gear. The visual effect is average and the audience reaction is also flat.

  Mario is also a boxer at this level.

Originally, West wanted him to reduce his weight and fight in the light heavyweight class. There are not many strong opponents at this level, but he couldn't lose weight at all and could only participate in the heavyweight class.

After the match was over, Mario was checked and walked onto the ring wearing boxing gloves. His opponent was also a Latino from Panama City in the northwest. He was 196 cm tall, with strong muscles and relatively long arms.

  After the game started, after several attempts, Mario's opponent took the lead in attacking, using his arm length advantage to hit Mario in the face, chest and abdomen.

  Mario was at a disadvantage in the first round, but he did a good job in defense and was not disrupted by his opponent.

  In the second round, Mario fought back, hitting his opponent in the chin with his fist and forcing his opponent into the corner.

"Mario, you acted too early."

  At the end of the second round, West pulled Mario to the rest area and said, "Your advantage is defense. You should defend first and try to drag the game into the third round. First, consume the opponent's strength, and then take the initiative to attack."

  "I understand. I know how to play. Don't worry, West. I will definitely win this game."

  Mario said excitedly.

  Bang!

  In the third round, Mario continued to attack and threw a right hook punch, knocking his opponent down in the face. The opponent fell to the ground, causing quite a stir at the scene.

Today's matches were generally not that exciting, and whenever a KO occurred on the stage, the audience would applaud.

  In the fourth round, Mario knocked down his opponent again. His opponent barely got up and lasted for a round. After being knocked down again in the sixth round, the referee ruled that Mario won.

  "roar!"

  After Mario won by KOing his opponent, he stood on the corner post, raised his fist excitedly, and shouted at the audience, who also gave him warm applause.

  Link clapped his hands as well.

  "Look, West, I won."

Mario shouted excitedly after he stepped off the stage.

  "You launched the attack too early. If you attack later, you will win more smoothly and save your energy for the next game."

  West commented.

  Mario laughed and patted his belly and said, "West, I understand what you mean, but there is no need to do that. The opponent just now looked very strong and had long arms. I thought he was very powerful, but after he punched me a few times, I found that his punches were very light, as if they were tickling me. I thought, since he is so weak, there is no need to continue to consume his strength. I started to attack and knocked him down with one punch. It felt great."

Mario pumped his fist and wiggled his hips excitedly, like Teddy in the seat next to him.

  "Mario, it's because you've been practicing with Link recently, and your ability to withstand blows has increased dramatically, so you feel that your opponent's punches are not heavy." Reggie said with a smile.

  Mario chuckled, "Yes, compared to Link, that guy's punches are indeed not that good, but Link, you beat me up every day, don't think I will be grateful to you."

  "No, but you have to be careful. There are many strong people in the heavyweight class."

"It doesn't matter. There aren't many top players in the Florida state division. I'm confident I can get a spot in the next round."

  Mario said with great confidence.

  West shook his head and pulled Mario to continue talking about tactics, asking him to follow the tactics in the next game and not play randomly. Mario kept nodding, but his eyes had already drifted to the butt of the female volunteer next to him.

  (End of this chapter)