Paul Gallen, Barry Hall and why they’re different to the rest of us
The difference between the amateurs and the pros is too great to imagine, and that’s why Paul Kent turned down the chance to spar with Paul Gallen - even if Gal would go easy on him.
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Several weeks ago a mischievous Shoosh item got printed in Phil Rothfield’s column that was the talk of no-one. It had more to do with subject than content.
“Which high-profile rugby league TV personality,” it said, “has politely knocked back an invitation to spar with ex-Sharks legend Paul Gallen for a story on his upcoming fight with Barry Hall.”
So shamefully the hand goes up.
Danny Green came to me with the idea to spar Gallen to promote the upcoming Gallen-Hall fight and before the sentence was finished I was in heavy reverse.
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Permitting somebody to punch you in the head is a young man’s game, although it must be said Gallen is borderline.
As for literary pursuits, though, definitely not.
Participation stories are the bells and trinkets of sports journalism.
It was popularised in the 1960s when American author George Plimpton took the plumb out of his mouth long enough to spend a pre-season camp with the Detroit Lions and turn it into a well-read book and movie. Alan Alda played the lead.
Plimpton’s trick was to bring the amateur into the professional world and show just how tough it could be.
By the time he had finished Plimpton had sparred Archie Moore, golfed on the PGA Tour, played with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, delivered jokes on stage as a stand-up and acted in movies. He got a book out of most of them.
In some ways, though, participatory stories are a deceit.
I did a few myself in younger years and realised that for all your best efforts the sheer gulf between rank amateurs and elite professionals is too much to grasp and almost impossible to cover. So it becomes a gimmick.
The pros never come out of it looking as good as they should, even as good as they look.
Their gift is their subtlety. Their expertise and understanding, which is so enormous and so precise it is difficult for the untrained to recognise.
That was the second good solid reason not to spar Gallen. The first failed to wash, claiming I was 49 and too ancient to spar even lightly against a just retired professional. Gallen, Rothfield reminded me, is 38.
But it is a worthy fight and one worth covering, and in this case the fact they are two ex-footballers should be ignored.
For years Johnny Lewis, the great trainer, has maintained Hall was the best boxing footballer he saw.
I spoke to an old trainer who refereed him as an amateur and he has no doubt that despite being on debut, against Gallen who is 9-0 with five knockouts, Hall will win.
Most footballers do their reputation more harm than good when they get in the ring. They are right hand heavy, no head movement and the moment a blow lands on them all sense of style deserts the body and the ring transforms into a pub car park.
There’s not a lot of science, to be fair, and not a lot is sweet.
This one will be different.
Wednesday I headed to Penrith’s Jabout gym to run an eye over Gallen’s spar with UFC fighter Tyson Pedro.
Pedro is six-five in the old scale, the same height as Barry Hall, and was warming up when Gallen walked in alone with a water bottle in his hand.
“Can you corner me?” he asked, looking my way.
His trainer Graham Shaw is in America for Daniel Lewis’s fight on a Bob Arum card tomorrow and Gallen needed at least one sympathetic voice in his corner. Failing that, someone to tip water in his mouth.
Pedro is seasoned and skilled and with his long reach, like Hall, he went to the jab early in imitation of how Hall will fight.
Pedro used the long reach and Gallen slipped and countered and worked to fight inside, showing skills not seen in the average footballer.
As his chief cornerman I was doing it fairly easy. The job was complex _ do you splash water over his head first or offer a drink? _ but after several rounds we fell into an easy rhythm. You’d have thought we’d been working together for years.
“What do you think?” he said after the second.
Small jewels of advice followed which, unfortunately, must be kept in the vault for the integrity of the competition.
Both fighters know so little about each other that any pearls of information are hungrily received, and sometimes even believed.
Hall, for instance, is said to have flown to Melbourne for sparring this week where it went magnificently. All the fight mob were talking about it.
Fair to say Pedro was impressed with Gallen and the two plan to spar again soon, the time and day a well-kept secret.
Afterwards, walking out, Gallen spoke about having that spar Green mentioned.
“I’ll go easy on you,” he offered.
I still wasn’t interested, even if he walked in with Tontine pillows strapped to his fists. I know far too well what it’s like to spar seasoned athletes and the pitfalls that can await.
Years ago I trained regularly with Jeff Fenech’s crew and sparred hundreds of rounds with Justin Rowsell, who was rated three in the world at the time.
Nader Hamdan made me bleed daily.
Rowsell was clever and far too slick and against him all you could bring was effort, which was never enough.
His best punch was always his left rip. It changed fights when he landed it and so he got to landing it regularly one day to the point it got frustrating, not to say painful, and talking afterwards my trainer gave a little tip.
When he steps left to open the angle step with him, he said, catch the left rip on your elbow, and the moment you feel it fire the uppercut because his left hand will be away from his face and he will be open.
Oh, you bet it worked a treat the next day.
Afterwards, other boxers in the gym like Hamdan and Hussein Hussein tapped me on the back and congratulated me. They were as surprised as I was at the outcome, watching Rowsell’s head snap up.
“Gee you were getting him with those uppercuts,” Hussein said.
The next day we sparred again and I was waiting for it. I thought about it all night.
Only, this is the subtlety the amateurs miss against the professionals and that mock sparring cannot reveal.
For all I know Gallen has got it in him as well and I don’t want to find out.
Rowsell stepped left and I stepped with him and fired the uppercut. Only, he feinted the rip.
So my right hand fired up and instead of snapping him under the chin I exposed a big slab of ribs, sitting above a frightfully vulnerable liver, and Rowsell was crouched and cocked and ready to go.
He did what good pros do and let that rip go like there was money on it.
When I hit the canvas I felt like my body was sucking me in, from the inside. I was collapsing inward. The only thing heading in an outward direction was the air in my lungs which came out in a long, involuntary groan.
The same fighters patting me on the back in the gym a day earlier were now in hysterics.
“You sound like you’re having a baby,” Fenech laughed.
How do you discover and then explain the difference between the pros and the rank novices without suffering that?
Nope, not for me.
WHY V’LANDYS IS THE MAN FOR THE HOUR
Those war drums you hear beating in the distance are long overdue.
They announce the promotion of Racing NSW boss Peter V’Landys as the new chairman of the Australian Rugby League Commission, a move that should encourage and embolden rugby league fans.
Anybody doubting how effective V’Landys is as an administrator needs only to look at the recent racing coverage.
V’Landys launched The Everest some years back and on Saturday launches the Golden Eagle at Randwick.
The revamped Sydney Spring Carnival having such an impact that Saturday’s VRC Derby has taken a backseat to the Sydney program.
Traditionalists might groan at the thought but V’Landys understands the sporting landscape is in constant motion and that what is popular today might not be popular tomorrow.
This is exactly what the NRL needs, because it is exactly what has happened.
There is no doubt the NRL has surrendered ground to AFL these past 20 years after then-AFL boss Andrew Demetriou secretly planned a strategy to grow AFL with a two-pronged strategy.
Demetriou planned to win over the mums, who decide where the kids play, and also set about stealing rugby league grounds, offering to fund the greenkeeping if councils replaced the league goalposts for AFL goalposts.
Hearts and land.
The NRL sat passively by.
V’Landys understands the big picture and, better still, has rolled his sleeves up for the fight.
If, as a sporting administrator, he can reduce Melbourne’s spring carnival to second billing, NRL fans can sit comfortably.
Originally published as Paul Gallen, Barry Hall and why they’re different to the rest of us
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