8 thoughts on “Excellent James Verini profile from 2012 of “Bernard Hopkins and the Endless End of Boxing””
Superb.
I had to make two passes at the piece, through no fault of Verini. Each time I ended up on YouTube, watching Hopkins fights and then lost in his lore. Temptations of the 24 fps footnote!
This, especially. As media appearances go it has the taste of a seance, and in no time the poor camerawork gives us a blurry, eyes-popped Bernard in full oracular mode riffing on the awfulness of Dan Rafael, toying with a quivering pressman who has manhood issues, and lecturing on the ways of Sheitan.
“BERNARD HOPKINS GOES OFF ON BADGERING BY MEDIA; SCHOOLS THEM ON TRICKNOLOGY”
Verini’s only ever boxing article. It’s pieces like that which really demonstrate the ludicrousness of Dan ‘Teletext’ Rafael walking away with the BWAA’s Fleischer award.
B-Hop is a raconteur like no other. He will make a fine broadcaster some day.
HBO should fire Ward & hire B-Hop as their expert analyst
I’ve added a new phrase to my lexicon with “tricknology”!
Also when he extolled his reading prowess, I can genuinely imagine him reading ‘The Great Gatsby’ in the evening, wearing his sweater and spectacles, taking intermittent pauses to contemplate outboxing Sergey Kovalev
Ha ha, love that image of Bhop reading his Fitzgerald. I would imagine Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm X, Cornel West too. He’ll need them all to get past Kovalev.
His pointed message to the room was a nice dig: “…and it’s not boxing magazines!”
Yes, Ward could not be duller. Btw, have you seen the HBO-produced shorts with Harold Lederman? A natural on camera and it’s like entering a Jimmy Durante/W.C. Fields timewarp.
Hahaha, yes I laughed hard at the “boxing magazines” remark also. BHop is nobody’s fool!
pound 4 pound ireland 
Superb.
I had to make two passes at the piece, through no fault of Verini. Each time I ended up on YouTube, watching Hopkins fights and then lost in his lore. Temptations of the 24 fps footnote!
This, especially. As media appearances go it has the taste of a seance, and in no time the poor camerawork gives us a blurry, eyes-popped Bernard in full oracular mode riffing on the awfulness of Dan Rafael, toying with a quivering pressman who has manhood issues, and lecturing on the ways of Sheitan.
“BERNARD HOPKINS GOES OFF ON BADGERING BY MEDIA; SCHOOLS THEM ON TRICKNOLOGY”
Verini’s only ever boxing article. It’s pieces like that which really demonstrate the ludicrousness of Dan ‘Teletext’ Rafael walking away with the BWAA’s Fleischer award.
B-Hop is a raconteur like no other. He will make a fine broadcaster some day.
HBO should fire Ward & hire B-Hop as their expert analyst
Vintage Hopkins interview btw.
I’ve added a new phrase to my lexicon with “tricknology”!
Also when he extolled his reading prowess, I can genuinely imagine him reading ‘The Great Gatsby’ in the evening, wearing his sweater and spectacles, taking intermittent pauses to contemplate outboxing Sergey Kovalev
Ha ha, love that image of Bhop reading his Fitzgerald. I would imagine Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm X, Cornel West too. He’ll need them all to get past Kovalev.
His pointed message to the room was a nice dig: “…and it’s not boxing magazines!”
Yes, Ward could not be duller. Btw, have you seen the HBO-produced shorts with Harold Lederman? A natural on camera and it’s like entering a Jimmy Durante/W.C. Fields timewarp.
Hahaha, yes I laughed hard at the “boxing magazines” remark also. BHop is nobody’s fool!
Do you mean the Jimmy’s Corner Lederman videos?
This series is called “Hey Harold!”
And yes, now I see what you meant by calling them Jimmy’s Corner. đŸ™‚
I’ve heard mixed things about ‘Jimmy’s Corner’ itself, but definitely a bar I’d like to visit someday