On the second day of the 99th WBA Convention, two honored guests will share their memories of their passion for boxing. The President, Gilberto Jesus Mendoza will open the conference by telling a historical review of the 99 years of the oldest organization in boxing.
These two boxing kings will participate virtually along with the President Gilberto Mendoza and are two of the oldest boxing promoters. We are talking about Mr. Bob Arum and Don King. They both are active nowadays and will share great stories involving their relationship with WBA Presidents.
Gilberto Jesus Mendoza became President on December 2015, and since then, he has worked extremely hard to uphold the vision of the man who lead the organization from 1982 to 2015. Mr. Mendoza resolved to join and humanize boxing through every action taken, such as the KO to Drugs Campaign. Boxing is in Mendoza’s blood, so he will try to get closer to all the people that helped him become who he is today.
We will meet Bob Arum, who born in Brooklyn on December 8, 1930 during the economic depression in the United States. Bob Arum is a lawyer, he represented the property confiscation case between Sony Liston and Floyd Patterson. This case put him on the path to become a boxing promoter in 1965. He now leads the Top Rank. Among the most famous bouts he has organized we can find the Sugar Ray Leonard vs Thomas Hearns bout, the Holyfield vs Foreman bout and the Hagler vs Leonard bout. Also, among the most famous boxers Arum has represented, we can find Oscar de la Hoya, Miguel Cotto, Manny Pacquiao, Erick Morales, and of course Julio Cesar Chavez, among many other leading figures that led him to the hall of fame.
Arum will be with another boxing legend, “Don” King, who was born on August 20, 1931 in Cleveland, Ohio. King led many boxers to glory, such as Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier, Mike Tyson, Evander Holyfield, Lennox Lewis, among other world idols. He got everyone’s attention when in 1973, he successfully negotiated the so-called “Rumble in the Jungle” in Zaire, Republic of the Congo, where Muhammad Ali and George Foreman took on one of the greatest fights of the 20th century.
In face of the 100th anniversary of the WBA coming up, this is a great opportunity to revive history through the voice of the main players and use their analyzes to establish new horizons to keep improving the boxing sport.
