George Kambosos Jr: The world title contender you’ve never heard of
He’s sparred with Manny Pacquiao and is one win away from a world title shot. So why don’t you know the name George ‘Ferocious’ Kambosos Jr?
The ink on his left fist says BLESSED. The ink on his right fist says AMBITION. The ink on his back says NEVER RETREAT, NEVER SURRENDER. Historical figures and religious symbolism dominate his canvas of skin: Achilles, Jesus Christ, King Leonidas. The ink on his collar bone says DREAM WITHOUT FEAR.
He strokes this last one and says we all have dreams when we are young and brave and unscarred and inspired. We have crazy dreams and beautiful dreams when the prospect of doing something great and improbable seems the very reason for our existence. When a bridge is something to jump from. When a tree is something to be climbed. When we are not yet old and grizzled enough to hear the voices of trepidation. The voices that say, but what if I fail? (You can’t fail!) The voices that say, but what if I make a fool of myself? (You can’t make a fool of yourself!) The voices that say, but what if I’m not good enough? (You are good enough!) The voices that say, but what is everyone going to think about me? (Who cares!)
“They’re the voices of fear,” says George ‘Ferocious’ Kambosos Jr. “To ignore them is a powerful thing. It’s a life-changing thing.
“I have a big dream. A huge dream. A difficult dream. I want to bring a world title to Australia. That is what is in my heart. If I fail, so be it. But look where I am. I am one win away from fighting for that title. My heritage is Greek, and I am a proud Australian. I have the Spartan warrior inside me, and I have the Anzac spirit. You cannot beat that sort of fight. I can only beat myself. To dream without fear … I refuse to be afraid of what I am trying to do.”
He’s the best fighter you have never heard of. One of the better-kept secrets in Australian sport. Left fist, blessed. Right fist, ambition. He’s 26. Done a few rounds at the tattoo parlour. He reminds me of a young Rafael Nadal. A young Steve Smith. He’s bullish and obsessed and fidgety. He cannot sit still. He wants to be a world champion prize fighter, but he wants to be more than that. He wants to be heroic. He wants to stand for the good things. Integrity. Hard work. Success. When he’s strapping his wrists, when he’s tying his boot laces, when he’s folding his “Be Ferocious” T-shirt, there’s an immaculate attention to detail. “I want everything I touch to turn to gold,” he says.
Why have you never heard of him? He’s been in America. Three years ago, with a 10-0 professional record in Australia, he’s been bold and wide-eyed and fanatical enough to jump on a plane to Los Angeles, get a run-down Airbnb in a rough part of Hollywood that ain’t exactly Hollywood, walk into Freddie Roach’s Wild Card gym and announce himself like a young Michelle Payne arriving in Melbourne and saying, “I’m available for track work.”
He’s become a sparring partner for hire in a ferocious ring, slugging it out with every world champion, ex-world champion and wannabe world champion who has walked through the door. The reason? To learn if his own world-title dream has been realistic or a joke.
“That was a lion’s den,” he says now, shaking his head. “There’s some wars in that ring. It’s make or break, that place. I sparred with some absolute animals. They walk in and everyone goes, man, he’s a beast. But I thought, bring it on. It felt like a Hollywood audition. I started getting the better of them and I thought, ‘I can actually do this’.”
He’s sparred against the great Manny Pacquiao’s sparring partners at Wild Card, and he’s out-sparred them all, so he’s become Pacquiao’s sparring partner for three world title campaigns. He’s hit bags with the great Pacquiao, he’s run roads with the great Pacquiao — 10km up to the Hollywood sign and back — he’s gone toe-to-toe with the great Pacquiao, he’s done gym work with the great Pacquiao, he’s done 2000 sit-ups a day with the great Pacquiao.
“I did 250 rounds with the guy,” Kambosos Jr says. “We traded some big leather together. To be invited three times, that was huge. I knew I was on the right path. After the first one, if they don’t like what’s going on, you’re not going to be invited back. I was the one who pulled the pin on it. I said, ‘Manny, I have to do my own thing. I’m a contender myself now’. He wanted me again for his next camp, but it was delaying my career. So I had to end it. He said to me, ‘You’re ready. You’re going to be a world champion.’ To hear that from him … I was ready, right there and then, to fight the world.”
Left fist blessed. Right fist, ambition. Kambosos Jr has racked up an 18-0 record while no one’s looking. He’s fought in Las Vegas and the holiest of holies, Madison Square Garden, where he’s beaten America’s former world champion Mickey Bey in December to become the IBF’s top lightweight contender.
It’s serious business from here. If he climbs into his immaculate white trunks, immaculate white boots and immaculate white gloves and knocks 33-year-old Welshman Lee Selby on his arse at Cardiff’s Motorsport Arena on October 3, he’ll likely meet the legendary Ukraine Vasiliy Lomachenko (WBA, WBO champion) in a blockbuster unification bout … in Australia. “I want that so bad,” he says. He’s lively. Talkative. Energetic. Engaging. He stands in the Gairy StClair Boxing Fitness Gym in the southern Sydney suburb of Gymea and talks about the fat 11-year-old kid, weighing 61 kilograms, who has become a 26-year-old fighting machine, weighing 61kg. “I was playing junior park footy for the Gymea Gorillas team,” he says. “I was an overweight, obese kid. I was bullied at school. I got into boxing purely for fitness for footy. My dad said, ‘Your off-season is when you put on weight. We could try Nippers.’
“You weren’t going to see this overweight kid out in the surf. He said, ‘What about a bit of boxing? You like the Rocky films. I said, ‘yeah, OK! Let’s do it!’ Within a year I got down to 44 kilos. Before I knew it my first coach was saying, ‘You’re ready to have your first fight.’ And I was like, ‘what? I’m only here to get fit!’
“Dad picked me up from the gym. I told him the coach wanted me to have a fight. He nearly drove off the road. He said the same as me. I thought we were only here to get fit. I was 12-and-a-half. It was an amateur fight in Queensland. I was on the plane thinking, ‘I’m actually going to fight someone?’”
He says: “The other kids looked so tough. Crooked noses. They’d obviously had a few fights. I thought, this is crazy. The kid I fought was huge. But I beat him. I had one thing going for me. I had a bit of willpower. I just kept going at him.
“You know when you remember something so well it’s a bit crazy? I can still remember the smell of the Vaseline. The sweat and the blood on the gloves. The blood is normally enough to drive a kid out of there. It made me want it more.” Kambosos lost so much weight that his footy came good. He went from prop to lock to hooker while the kilograms were shed.
“I made the Cronulla (NRL club) development squad,” he says. “Ricky Stuart sat us down and gave us the spiel. I was in the state boxing squad by then, too. My old man said, ‘You’re going to come to a crossroads one day. You’re going to have to choose.’ One Monday, footy and boxing clashed. That was the crossroads. He said, ‘I’ll see you when I finish work. You can tell me if we’re going to boxing or the footy’. He came home and I had my boxing bag packed. I was 13. I said, ‘Dad, I’m going to be a fighter. And I’m going to give it everything I have’.”
Left fist, right fist, blessed ambition. Kambosos Jr versus Selby has been postponed twice by COVID-19. Now it’s been confirmed for October. Fighting a Welshman in Cardiff — it will be on for young and old. Australians pile onto the boxing bandwagon when a serious pugilist comes along, and so Kombosos Jr is invited to introduce himself to the uninitiated.
He makes unblinking eye contact and says: “I am a serious fighter. I am a world-rated contender. I have been fighting on the world scene, fighting in the big arenas. My ambition is extreme and my time is coming.
“Most Australians aren’t privileged, and I’m the same. We’ve all got to earn our opportunities, and I’ve earned mine. There’s no famous surname behind me. No silver spoon. All I’ve had from day one is my own name: George Kombosos Jr, the hungry young lion from Sydney, the ferocious warrior. I’ll tell you what I have. I have a dream inside me that cannot be stopped. I am going to shock the world.”
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