David Benavidez doesn’t respect leaked sparring sessions!
Traditionally speaking, the sparring sessions that fighters engage in are a confidential matter. These are moments when boxers get to work on their craft and fine tune different tools and adjustments.
For generations, there’s remained an unspoken rule that what goes on in these training sessions does not leave the gym. In the past, those who broke this long standing commandment were embraced with ridicule.
Times seem to be changing.
As technology has changed our daily lives, this change has found its way to boxing. While smartphones and their numerous features have made somethings better, their use has complicated others.
In terms of sparring, the small devices have made it criminally easy to record a sparring session and post it online before anyone is the wiser.
Despite the long-established viewpoint that sparring sessions are private, with increasing frequency these sessions continue to leak.
Gervonta “Tank” Davis leaked footage from his session with the Cleveland based fighter Montana “Too Pretty” Love.
Connor McGregor leaked snippets of his sparring session with Paul Malingnaggi. The footage was somewhat old at the time of release. However, even Teofimo Lopez was seen dropped in a bit of leaked sparring video just to name a few instances.
BENAVIDEZ WEIGHS IN
Recently, former super middleweight champion David Benavidez had a well-publicized sparring session with WBC welterweight champion Shawn Porter.
Following this well-documented training date, Benavidez would answer questions on his opinion of the new trend to disclose training footage. Not surprisingly, the young talent was not in favor of the taboo action.
Along with siding with tradition, Benavidez offered his own take on the unsavory matter.
“The guys that knock people out in sparring sessions those are just guys that don’t know nothing about boxing. […]
“It’s most of the time when a sparring partner knocks somebody out, in reality who is the other guy that they knocked out? […]
“That shit is really not cool because you’re not only hurting the person, your embarrassing the person too. Most of these guys, their just regulars in the gym. […] If you’re going to knock someone out and put it online, knock a champion out or knock a top contender out.
“That’s why you don’t see too many top contenders and champions get dropped because it’s usually the people that don’t have that much experience that get dropped.”
Unfortunately, it’s unlikely that the new trend will go away. In today’s modern era, recording others or oneself is proving to be very addictive activity to millions of people.
Amazingly enough, the lure to post self-made videos is so great that it’s a common occurrence for people to even post themselves committing crimes!
Sad to say, if jail time and fines are not enough of a deterrent, then it’s extremely unlikely that merely violating the long-recognized golden rule of sparring will either.
By: Bakari Simpson
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