Clottey lost to Cotto because he'd rather bonk than tonk

Some headlines just stick with you over the years.

It’s hard to beat “HEADLESS BODY IN TOPLESS BAR” which emblazoned the front page of (dear alma mater) New York Post.

Recently, in a Johnny Knoxville “Jackass” move in which my bike and I were KTFO’d by a moving car, the local rag could’ve run this one: “X RAYS OF MARLEY’S HEAD SHOW NOTHNG” but they didn’t.

One of my favorite boxing headlines was in a British tabloid when I was in London with middleweight champ Gerald “G Man” McClellan in the days before his war against Nigel Benn, a fight which left McClellan crippled for life.

McClellan was a free speaking guy and he emphasized that, while his libido was powerful, he favored boxing above all.

“MCCLELLAN: I’D RATHER TONK THAN BONK.”

Translated into American English from UK slang, I was told it meant that the fighter preferred fighting over having sex.

Which brings me around to Joshua Clottey, whose trainer of five years duration tells me lost his June Madison Square Garden bout against upcoming Manny Pacquiao foe Miguel Cotto because he was oversexed and not overtrained.

Yes, you read that correctly. Trainer Samuel Assante believes Clottey’s fight week bonking left him unable to do enough tonking to defeat the rugged Puerto Rican.

(media.canada.com)

And it was surprising that Clottey, like Assante a native of Ghana, did not rev up his offensive attack in the final three rounds of a close, competitive fight. Clottey explained this by saying he was fearful of getting nailed by a single KO punch by the Puerto Rican banger.

(HBO commentator Manny Steward said he thought Clottey deserved the verdict but a 114-113 Clottey score was overruled by Cotto tallies of 116-111 and 115112.)

 (Click here to see round by round notes on that fight from Bleacher Report/BoxingWatchers.com.)

Boxing oldtimers insisted on having their fighters abstain from sexual relations close to fight night because they believed prolonged sexual play robbed boxers of their leg strength and sapped them of needed energy.

(Any you of nonvirigins in the Michael Marley worldwide audience may recall the satisfied feeling a man often derives from a pleasureable sex session. You’re usually not in a post-coital fighting mood. But I’m just going on ancient memory here.)

Assante told me he thinks Clottey’s being shacked up with his girlfriend for a full week cracked up his chances of beating Cotto.

“Joshua could have beaten Cotto and he can beat Pacquiao,” Assante said.

“But Joshua wouldn’t listen to nobody, he thinks he knows it all.”

In the wake of the split decision loss, Clottey went home to Africa and put Assante on verbal blast.

“He paid my 10 percent,” Assante said. “But he tried to blame me for losing to Cotto. Everyone in Ghana knows Joshua by now. The people think he is a jerk, he is hated by the people. He said I didn’t give him the proper advice in the corner which is a lie.”

Assante said that, the day of the fight, Clottey and the girlfriend went on a midtown Manhattan shopping excursion.

The bottom line, Assante said, was that Clottey did not exactly go into the Garden ring with the proverbial eye of the tiger.

There were other disruptions in the Clottey camp, the now former trainer said.

“Joshua does not speak to his brother Emmanuel even though they live in the same place in The Bronx. Emmanuel, who is an ex-boxer, had to buy a ticket to see the fight. Instead, Joshua brought in a guy named Ishmael Ayer from Ghana to carry his bags around.”

Assante said broke camp two days earlier and skipped needed training including sparring, to spend time with the galpal.

Clottey continues to train in the old Adonis Torres Gym in the South Bronx, at 150th and Westchester, as does Assante and his remaining fighters.

They do not speak to each other any longer but Assante insists he told Clottey to step it up in the final rounds.

“It’s on the TV tape,” Assante said. “I told him to fight harder. He could’ve won the fight and maybe now it be would him fighting Pacquiao.

“He could beat Pacquiao but he didn’t do what he needed to do to beat Cotto.”

Evidently, doing what he needed to do between the sheets affected his late round surge or lack of same.

(I must run this by my local sexologist soon. Her name is Randy Orgasmore.)

I guess they could’ve flipped the UK headline for Clottey.

Like so: “JOSH CLOTTEY: I’D RATHER BONK THAN TONK.”

(mlcmarley@aol.com)