THE ESCAPE ARTIST

WHILE both stuck in time and stuck inside, my boxing comfort watch at the peak of last year’s COVID-19 lockdown seemed to be anything that involved Pernell “Sweet Pea” Whitaker. And there were, I think, several reasons for this.

The first reason was an obvious one: Whitaker was, having sadly passed away just six months before the world stopped, both a fighter still fresh in my mind and a fighter sorely missed. But, as well as that, more than that, I likely turned to Whitaker in solitude, when trapped inside the same four walls for days on end, because there is no one better than Pernell Whitaker to demonstrate how to remain creative and productive in the tightest and scariest of spaces. This was, after all, his forte. His gift. His magic trick.

A world-renowned disappearing act, Whitaker, in his prime, successfully made a career of sitting in the pocket with opponents, always putting himself in harm’s way, and would, time and time again, somehow not only avoid being hurt in these situations but also find openings to land punches of his own, doing so with the sneakiest of pivots or twists. Rarely would fans see Whitaker run and rarely did the claustrophobia or danger of being trapped on the inside with an opponent – sometimes bigger, sometimes stronger – ever seem to adversely affect him. Boxing’s Houdini, what to most were dead ends were to Whitaker ways out; escape routes.

Another reason why the appeal of Sweet Pea increased during the past 12 months owes to the nagging suspicion that fighters of his ilk – genuine craftsmen with nuance and layers to their game – are in danger of becoming a dying breed in a sport now geared towards fans with short memories and attention spans, as well