Lou DiBella
Lou DiBella (born May 17, 1960 in Brooklyn , New York ) is an American boxing promoter. He also owns the Connecticut Defenders minor league baseball team .
DiBella, who claims to have become a boxing fan because of Muhammad Ali , attended New York City's famous Regis High School in Manhattan . He graduated from Tufts University with Summa Cum Laude and graduated from Harvard University in 1985 .
He became known in the 1990s as the operational head of the boxing section of the richest broadcaster in the world, HBO (under the controversial Seth Abraham ) and was considered comparatively honest in his eleven years at the station.
In 2000 he left the station and started his own business in a kind of promoter / manager position, which is very unusual in the USA. Later he was forced by new legislation to define exactly what he does professionally and has since called himself a "promoter". The success was mixed.
He experienced serious bankruptcies with five of the six boxers signed after the Olympic Games. Especially amateur world champion Michael Bennett , who failed because of his "glass chin" and the Olympic silver medalist Ricardo Williams , to whom he gave 1.4 million US dollars for a contract signature and was sentenced to three years in prison for drug trafficking after two embarrassing defeats. Clarence Vinson, Jose Navarro and the Dominican Jerson Ravelo were not quite successful.
On the other hand, he reached a joint venture with rap couturier Damon Dash and made Jermain Taylor a star.
The Hopkins Affair
DiBella had to experience a huge disappointment with his first world champion Bernard Hopkins . Hopkins, whom he had already brought to HBO from oblivion, was pressured by Don King to leave DiBella and sign with him if he wanted a million-dollar fight against Félix Trinidad . Because this was spectacular even for boxing standards, Hopkins wanted to justify himself by making completely unfounded allegations against his mentor that DiBella, as HBO manager, had demanded a $ 50,000 bribe from him so that his fights could be televised . The furious DiBella sued him, which is considered extremely difficult in the US legal system for things like defamation. But DiBella got right and was awarded $ 610,000 in compensation for pain and suffering. Further revenge came later when his boxer Jermain Taylor beat Hopkins twice.
Other boxers from DiBella
- Deontay Wilder
- Andre Berto
- Ike Quartey
- Sechew Powell
- Paul Malignaggi
- Jaidon Codrington
- Jose Navarro
- Zsolt Erdei (first fight in Atlanta November 20, 2010)
- Sergio Gabriel Martinez
- Jo Jo Dan
Web links
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | DiBella, Lou |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American boxing promoter |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 1959 or 1960 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | new York |