Winky Wright Begins Final Charge

In the life of Winky Wright, fame and fortune have all but fought frustration and frequent flyer miles to a 12-round draw.

He's traveled the globe for fights, moved up and down in weight more than Oprah, and been ducked so often he might as well be a jury summons in boxing trunks.

But after a 18 years of panhandling for bouts, Wright finally has found someone that won't swerve out of the way.

Of course, that someone might give up a weight advantage to a loaded spit bucket, and stands, when he stands instead of tumbling over, knee-high to a ringpost. But his anywhere, anytime demeanor burns in his DNA.

He is Wright's 22-month old son, the only opponent the former undisputed junior middleweight champion has faced in the past two years, and a smiling reminder that no matter how many people may jump from his path, his future, his life after boxing is coming straight and true.

And perhaps soon.

"It's been a lot of fun just playing with my son these past few months," say the family man Wright, who has two other children, a son, 12, and a daughter, 9. "The time off was a chance to think about what life will be after boxing once you stop fighting and I'm in a good place. I'm settled and happy in life. An when it's over with, it's over with. I enjoyed it, the game did a lot for more. I proved I was one of the greats of my era and now it's time to think about a transition period."

These are the last days of Winky Wright.

He says he has no timetable now, but is looking at a possible three-fight farewell, starting with a showdown against former welterweight champion Paul Williams (36-1, 27 KOs), like Wright (51-4-1, 25 KOs),another of boxing's avoided fighters who's never quite seemed able to pick on someone his own size (HBO World Championship Boxing, 10PM ET). Williams' victory over Antonio Margarito, and a generally low profile have conspired to make the arithmetic of fighting "The Punisher" a high-risk, low reward proposition.

And that's exactly why Wright wants to start his final charge with Williams, to prove that a fighter no one else would face couldn't hold a candle to a man who embraces the title of boxing's most avoided fighter.

"I'm not coming back just to be fighting," Wright says. "I could've picked a bum to come back on and get the win, like a lot of fighters do, but that just ain't me. I want to prove I'm still the best, even with the long layoff."

Beating Williams will be no simple matter. The ropy, long-limbed Williams has a reach farther than any fighter Wright has faced, including his last opponent, former middleweight and lightweight champion Bernard Hopkins.

At 82 inches, Williams could just about punch out anyone in the front row without leaving the ring.

"There's always a concern fighting anybody but if you are a fighter that's what you do," Wright says. "You've got to come in and fight the best. And you know, my whole career I wanted to fight the best. I didn't go out searching for the runner-up. I wanted the best and, you know, as you can see I'm proving. I'm putting my money where my mouth is, you know, right here with Paul."

Following the fight with Williams, Wright says he hopes to fight again at the end of the year, possibly in Washington D.C., where he was born and lived for 15 years before moving to St. Petersburg, Fla.

After that, Wright expects to set up a a big-money fight in 2010.

"And if that's it, that's it," Wright says. "If there's another big fight out there, we'll make it, but if not, I might hang them up."


Even at the end of his career, Wright has never been able to escape the thought that maybe it should've been easier.

Figuring out why Wright has never become an American Idol of the boxing ring despite tremendous talent -- he's lost just once this decade despite facing nine opponents who were current or former world champions -- and a personality, that, like his face, is dominated by one big pillar-to-post smile, is easier than figuring out Wright as a fighter.

In the ring, he's a Rubik's Cube in boxing gloves. And even if you beat him, as Hopkins did in Wright's last fight, it isn't a telegenic fight. For boxers, the only thing worse than losing, heck, maybe it is worse than losing, is not looking good. Boxers are paid both for the ability to win, but above all, their ability to entertain.

But after Wright twice thoroughly beat Shane Mosley in 2004 and beat Felix Trinidad in from ring post to ring post to retirement in his first pay-per-view event in the spring of 2005, he thought the payday of his popularity would outweigh the risk any bout with him would entail.

"I thought it would be easier, but guys still found a way to duck me," Wright says matter-of-factly. "I beat these guys, brought in great television, and was thinking it's going to be easy for me to get fights. But it got harder. Folks were coming to see me, fighters would've gotten paid, so promoters would say this or that, but it made no sense. Guys didn't want to fight me."

As proof, Schaeffer offered up a list of six names during a conference call with reporters, five of which he says he couldn't get to fight Wright, including Arthur Abraham, Vernon Forest, Michael Kessler and Jermain Taylor, whom Winky fought to a controversial draw in 2006 but was unable to secure a rematch. Whose camp was at fault for not re-matching that bout depends on who you ask.

But Wright certainly hasn't been at the top of any invitation list. He derailed Shane Mosley's career with two consecutive wins and ended Tito Trinidad's (or should've -- Trinidad returned for an ill-advised loss to Roy Jones two-and-a-half years later).

Even if you beat him, it'd be a little like taking a checkered flag at Daytona while driving a moped. You might get the victory, but you won't look good doing it.

"if you have a guy who is as tricky and as good as Winky Wright is, the fact is the other guys are not just lining up to fight Winky Wright," explains Schaeffer, his current promoter. "I mean, he's almost too good for his own good. That's the bottom line."

So Wright's career-long race to make up for lost time is now a race against time, to find enough top-name, top-talent fighters to step in the ring with him while still near his peak. He's already missed the chance to fight De La Hoya, which would've been a symbolic match as much as a likely in-ring mismatch in recent years for Wright, as the Golden Boy took the blue-chip path to stardom from the '92 Olympics while Wright elected to turn pro after failing to make the 1990 Goowdill Games, leading to a lengthy fight to the top. Not to mention the huge paydays that were as much a part of the De La Hoya legacy as the gold medal he won in the '92 games.

But even that Wright turns into a positive, embracing his hard-knock road to the top.

"Everybody De La Hoya fought helped financially and made their name visible," Wright said. "But he never wanted to fight me. That's another notch on my belt of another so-called great that didn't want to fight me."

But Williams won't have to call his name twice The 27-year-old is 10 years Wright's junior and another man whose traveled weight classes in search of someone to fight, Williams respects Wright for their similar booking problems, but as a result, understands all too well what one opportunity truly means.

"Old dogs, "Williams warned in the final press conference, "can't run from young dogs."

Like everything else in Wright's career, beating Williams will be the hard way around the mountain. But if the time off since his last fight and before his final charge have taught him anything, it's that he certainly has a fallback opponent he can call on at any time, now 22 months and growing.