R.I.P, Mike Quarry

[kikibalt]

[StingerKarl]

Terrific technician but without a punch.
He could have won the title in a different era, but happened to be in the years that Foster dominated the sport.
I heard Bob Foster say that Quarry was the best fighter he ever fought.
I loved the way he and Jerry rolled, their rhythm was excellent.
Truly sorry to hear of this as I am friends with some of the Quarry's.
Thanks to Mr. Baltazar for posting that.
Karl

[kikibalt]

I remember sometime back in the 1960s, it was 1968 I believe but I might be wrong on the year, Mike was fighting in the Golden Gloves at the El Monte Legion Stadium, I believe it was in the finals, anyway right after Mike's fight was over some of the Quarrys got into a fight with some of the fans, Mike was still in the ring, while all hell broke lose outside the ring I jump inside the ring with some other people, Rick Farris was one of them and we just let the Quarrys take care of business outside the ring.
The good old days of the Quarrys.

Thanks Mike for all the good times.

Frank Baltazar

[Ron Lipton]

Have there been any pictures of Mike taken since his fighting days.

Any pictures in the last 10 years?


Just such a tragedy, so sad. 55 is so young to go through what this poor guy did.

[gregbeyer]

ron,

go to the jerry quarry foundation website. i believe they have some fairly recent shots of mike there.
greg

[KOJOE90]

Rest In Peace.

[kikibalt]

Mike Quarry



Mike and Jerry Quarry

[kikibalt]

[KOJOE90]

The site is somewhat out of date but incase you have not seen it.

http://www.jerryquarry.com/index.html

[mrbig1]

Damn, I hated to learn of his death. R.I.P.

[Chuck1052]

I am saddened to learn that Mike Quarry has passed away in a nursing
home. It is my hope that his family and fans accept my condolences.

Ten or twenty years ago, there were rumors about Mike having some
brain damage.

It is my understanding that Bobby Quarry also sustained some brain
damage. By the way, I once saw Bobby fight in Bakersfield and
came away with the conviction that he had minimal talent
at best.

Although Jerry Quarry wasn't a "Fancy Dan" in the ring, he was more
than a "puncher." In fact, he had quite a bit of boxing skill, gaining
quite a bit of ink being being a good counterpuncher during his
career.

- Chuck Johnston

[gregbeyer]

chuck,

i saw bobby twice at the aviation gym against rodney stockton. once he gained a win via a terrible decision...the second time larry rosadilla gave bobbys fans no credence and stopped the fight in stocktons favor.

i heard bobby was doing or did some time in the joint but did not hear he had sustained brain damage. that would be salting the wound....leaving only brother jim unscathed.
greg

[Chuck1052]

Greg- Thanks for the info.

- Chuck Johnston

[kikibalt]

Ellen & Mike Quarry






Mike Quarry vs Tommy Hicks

[gregbeyer]

damn..that is a very disturbing article.

thank god mike found such a wonderful lady to watch over him in his declining years.
greg

[kikibalt]

damn..that is a very disturbing article.

thank god mike found such a wonderful lady to watch over him in his declining years.
greg

Every man should be so lucky.

Frank

[fatcity]

Extremely disturbing.... did Mike really take that much punishment during his career?... I know the loss to Foster was bad and he had a long career but there seems to be many boxers who had more punishing careers yet did not end up suffering like this. Is this perhaps due to genetic vulnerbility in Jerry and Mike which make them more prone to developing dementia?...

[gregbeyer]

yeah mike did take a lot of punnishment. most his fights were distance affairs. he suffered stoppages late in his career. the bob foster ko was enough alone to do serious damage and sparring with a heavyhitting heavyweight brother did him no good. i always thought it was silly for mike to have been sparring with jerry. especially the way they went at it.
greg

[gregbeyer]

BTW...when chuck brought up younger brother bobby i realized it was during bobby's fights with rodney stockton at the aviation gym in el segundo that i last saw mike.

it was a little strange because when mike got into the ring to work the corner before the fight he was jumping up and down and throwing combinations in the air. i would have swore he thought he was fighting.

after the fight , which ended in a hotly disputed decision in favor of bobby, mike was ready to brawl with the stockton corner. jerry got in his way and later i heard him admonishing mike for trying to get into a fight...jerry wagged his finger in mikes face and said " no no...i saw you mike".

this was years before either jerry or mike was diagnosed with dementia. i just wrote it off as another case of the quarry's getting their dander up. still it was strange how mike got right into character as soon as his feet touched the canvas.
greg

[kenmore]

I remember feeling happy for Mike late in 1976 when he beat number one contender Tom Bethea by decision. That's because this win catapulted him back to the top of the world ratings, after years of mixed luck, heartbreak, and even being dropped from the top 10 for while.

Mike was promised a title shot against either John Conteh or Victor Galindez as a result of the Bethea win. Indeed: it seemed that the sun was finally breaking through the stormclouds for the younger Quarry.

But a few months later Mike lost a hotly disputed decision to the then unrated Mike Rossman, and a nationally televised rematch yielded the unthinkable: Quarry losing by TKO, only the second time in his long career that he failed to finish a fight.

It was an emotional scene that night in Quarry's dressing room following the Rossman bout, as he announced his retirement from boxing. I read that everyone laughed heartily though --including Mike-- when Jerry took a photograph of Mike's stitched up face, remarking that he would use it as a warning to "anyone out there who thinks he wants to take up boxing."

After losing to Rossman, Quarry made a comeback, but by his own admission had totally lost his motivation, stopped training seriously and began indulging coke heavily. The result was a massive deterioration in the quality of his performances, and he probably shouldn't have been boxing at all those final years.

In his prime, Quarry was a pretty good fighter who was worthy of the top 10. Only his lack of a serious punch (less than 20 kayoes over 80 fights) kept him from being a perennial threat to the champions

Ironically, one of Mike's best fights was a bout he lost. That was against top contender Pierre Fourie in South Africa, in 1974. Quarry actually knocked Fourie down and cut him up seriously. Fourie won the decision, but observers say the nod could have gone either way.

Mike Quarry: Rest in peace...I genuinely appreciate the memories.

[PeteLeo]

Actually, there has been some medical research indicating that certain families of people are genetically predisposed to develop what used to be known as "punch drunkenness," in some cases even in the absence of undue head trauma. I'm not trying to get boxing off of the hook here, because I believe if Mike and Jerry hadn't laced on the gloves they'd be with us now, but there's real reason to think that their brains were "programmed" in a way to overreact to the punishment they did receive. This was discussed on television around the time that the severity of Jerry's condition became widely known.

I recall one of those syndicated reality shows (probably "A Current Affair") doing a story on Jerry around then. The guy still looked great, though he could no longer carry on a conversation. When shown a video clip of one of his wins, however -- I think it was from the Shavers bout --, he grinned broadly and smacked that ham of a right fist into his left palm. God, it sounded like a baseball bat slamming into a side of beef. On the small screen, we often forget just how fucking powerful these men really are. PeteLeo.

[Chuck1052]

A friend of mine told me that he talked to both Bobby
and Mike Quarry at a boxing gathering in Los Angeles
about a year-and-a-half ago. I was told that Bobby
looked to be o.k. and that Mike remembered his first
professional fight. Could it be that Mike's long-term
recall wasn't as bad as his short-term memory?

Jimmy Young had incrediable long-term recall of events
that took place during his boxing career, but it is my
understanding that his short-term memory wasn't that
good.

I am sorry if I was wrong about Bobby Quarry sustaining
brain damage.

- Chuck Johnston

[kikibalt]

[gregbeyer]

when did jimmy die?
greg