26 years and five months after a fifth-round stoppage win over then-unbeaten future champion Chris Byrd, Ike Ibeabuchi was successful in his long-awaited boxing return. <\/p>\n
Idris Afinni (18-9-2, 15 KOs) was his short-notice opponent, not Danny Williams as first planned, and the 40-year-old gave as good as he got on the back foot before retiring after three completed rounds at Lagos’ Teslim Balogun Stadium, Nigeria overnight. <\/p>\n
Ibeabuchi (21-0, 16 KOs) looked every bit the muscle-bound 6ft 2in heavyweight many critics deemed a divisional boogeyman in the 1990s, though now 52 and three decades later, it’s impossible to ignore the circumstances which led us here. <\/p>\n
Nicknamed ‘The President’, the Isuochi-born Nigerian was making his first professional appearance back on home soil after basing himself in Dallas, Texas another lifetime ago.<\/p>\n
Ibeabuchi was deported back to Nigeria in 2021, having served a 16-year jail term for battery with intent, attempted sexual assault and violating parole conditions. <\/p>\n
His story was sad but far from unique, another promising boxing career cut short by a life of crime. It serves as another reason many – fans and journalists alike – try their best to separate the very best athletes from their beliefs, interests and extracurricular activities.<\/p>\n
Prizefighting.tv, who proudly took charge of Ibeabuchi’s return and offered it at a $30 pay-per-view price, heralded this show as a historic event and while Ibeabuchi planned to return as early as November 2015, he was rearrested before that desire could become reality.<\/p>\n
During the build-up, Ike bullishly told reporters at a press conference that his 26-year layoff ‘meant nothing’ and that he would prove exactly that, albeit against an unheralded name 13 years his junior – who campaigned at cruiserweight and only had three victories over opposition with positive win-loss records.<\/p>\n
Speaking of, he was consistent with a desire to elevate from carefully-presented squash matches to the glamour division’s very best: calling out two-weight undisputed champion Oleksandr Usyk<\/a>. Tyson Fury<\/a> and the Mancunian’s Queensberry stablemate Moses Itauma<\/a> were also names on his shortlist when speaking to Yahoo Sports pre-fight<\/a>.
Mike Tyson<\/a> and Oliver McCall are just two notable names who’ve made in-ring returns with contrasting success over the past year, while Evander Holyfield<\/a>‘s short-lived 2021 comeback should serve as a timely warning for others seeking the same. It won’t. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"26 years and five months after a fifth-round stoppage win over then-unbeaten future champion Chris Byrd, Ike Ibeabuchi…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":89447,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2560,44739,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-89446","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-boxing","8":"tag-boxing","9":"tag-ike-ibeabuchi","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-uk","12":"tag-united-kingdom","13":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89446","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=89446"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89446\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/89447"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=89446"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=89446"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=89446"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}