Ammo Williams Silver Lining in Video Backlash
Within the sport of boxing there has long existed the unwritten rule that whatever transpires in sparring remains a secret.
As this is where fighters fine tune their craft it is thought to be in “bad taste” to reveal those activities to the public at large. Rising middleweight prospect Austin “Ammo” Williams (5-0, 4 KO’s) has just found this out the hard way.
While going a bit stir crazy during the COVID19 lockdown, Williams found a great deal of relief in pouring himself into his training. Feeling that he had made notable improvements the Matchroom Boxing signed pugilist uploaded footage of him sparring to his social media.
SPARRING SNAFU
When the video hit the public, Williams was immediately hit with a wave of criticism by boxing enthusiasts who thought it was all very crass.
Since the initial backlash, he has issued formal apologies and insisted that it was never his intention to be vulgar or shame his sparring partner. In recent interview with IFL TV Williams delved a bit deeper into his thoughts on the matter.
“The sparring session surfaced and it looked how I wanted it to look and you know I felt like I took it easy on the kid because I walked off.
“As you can see in the video I walked off from it at times I could have hit him, lightened up my shots but I showed that I could hit the kid with whatever shot I wanted to.
“And it just backfired on me and as I said before in the other video were I did say my apology, I said that now that I am out of the heat of the situation and I can look back on the situation without my excitement of what I have achieved, I said I can see what people are saying.
“You know what, let me take the video down, apologize to the kid because it’s not about the kid, its nothing about the kid. It was actually about me entertaining you guys in such a drought time, in such a slow time.”
NOTHING NEW
Although he has now learned his lesson, Ammo did admit that the whole ordeal threw him off a bit. The main reason for his brief bewilderment is the fact that he is no stranger to posting videos of his sparring footage.
As he has tried to build his name and reputation in the industry, Williams has always shown bits of his sparring videos to the public. However, clearly this was the first time that it blew up in his face.
“If you got through my InstaGram, I haven’t deleted anything else, you can go down to the beginning of Ammo you know? Before I was pro, and you can see that I been doing this!
“I’ve been doing this same thing in sparring and people loved it! Some people didn’t like it. But at the end of the day it was excepted and everybody knew me as a guy that you may see a knockout not only from this fight but you may see one in sparring!
“That’s who Ammo is!”
THE GOOD FROM BAD
Luckily for Williams out this minor scandal he was able to emerge with two silver linings. First and foremost he now knows that he must be more discerning when selecting what sparring footage to share with the public.
Also, Ammo has also come to realize that the attention from this whole ordeal has granted him a whole new opportunity.
“Even the video is still communicating to my promotional company, communicating to my management company that I am ready to go! I’m not a fighter that is sitting back doing push-up challenges and two miles challenges for InstaGram. I really have been working!
“I’ve been working cerebrally, I’ve been working mentally, physical, emotionally, every way there is to work I’ve been increasing my game and it’s going to show in videos like that, training and videos all of those types of things which are showing Eddie [Hearn] without having to speak to him directly that I’m making leaps!
“I’m ready for bigger fights and things like that.
“So to be able to get my career back on the same fast track as my amateur career and put me back in that realm of top level fighters, that was the best thing that could have possibly happened from this!
“That was probably the greatest positive that came from such a negative experience for myself.”
By: Bakari Simpson
