Well-known boxing promoter and former front man of the now defunct EliteXC mixed martial arts promotion, Gary Shaw was responsible for taking a Miami street fighter by the name of Kimbo Slice from Youtube to primetime CBS television and creating one of the biggest stars MMA had ever seen.

Of course, Shaw also helped sink the same ship he had helped build, but that’s another story.

Following the demise of EliteXC and with the end of Kimbo Slice’s MMA career, Shaw had intentions of promoting Slice as a professional boxer. After all, if Kimbo had one thing going for him it was his heavy hands. However, Kimbo’s boxing career never got off the ground.

In this recent interview with FightHub TV’s Marcos Villegas, Shaw says Slice found out how hard it was to be a boxer. He says he had Slice in training in California but he wasn’t committed.

As to why Slice was not committed, Shaw speculates he made so much money during his MMA career he just did not need the money bad enough to put in the work to be a pro boxer.

Early in Slice’s MMA career, fans might remember he was being trained by mixed martial arts legend Bas Rutten, however, Rutten stopped working with Slice and cited similar reasons of the former street fighter not being committed.

Shaw also gives his thoughts on Strikeforce welterweight champion Nick Diaz’s desire to box. As the former manager of Jeff Lacy, who was originally named as Diaz’s first opponent, Shaw says if Diaz is going to box he needs to fight relevant names and says Lacy is not relevant, and neither is Fernando Vargas.

2 thoughts on “Gary Shaw on Kimbo Slice: “He realized how hard it is to be a boxer””
  1. Kimbo was a backyard fighter, gave it up to become an MMA fighter, gave it up to go on Survivor, gave it up to wrestle, gave it up to box, gave it up to smoke crack.

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