Patience is not without its

consequences. Following his close July 2007 loss to Bernard Hopkins, Winky

Wright was still considered one of the Top 5 Pound for Pound fighters in the

sport. Then suddenly Wright stopped fighting, claiming both lack of suitable

opponents and financial compensation for a fighter of his caliber. Now 21

months after his last fight, the former undisputed junior middleweight has

finally found a foil in the similarly avoided Paul “The Punisher” Williams. But

at 37 years old, will time finally run out this Saturday (April 11, HBO Sports)

on the elite former champ?

AllHipHop.com: Thank you for making time out of your training

schedule. First question is the one that everyone has for you. After the

Hopkins fight you were still considered a Top 5 Pound for Pound fighter. What

reasons kept you out of the ring for so long?

Winky Wright: No problem, my brother. Well, nobody wanted to

fight. It was just that simple. And it wasn’t that I didn’t want to fight or anything…

I just couldn’t get anyone to fight. So I just had to wait until somebody

wanted it. [Editors Note: During the last

two years, potential fights with Kelly Pavlik, Jermain Taylor, and Vernon

Forrest all failed to move forward] AllHipHop.com: The one person that has come in is Paul

Williams. He’s had a history already in his young career of being avoided by

marquee fighters. Was he the only fighter that stepped up, or did you have

other fighters in mind before you made your final decision?

Wright: It was pretty much [just] him. HBO gave us some names. All the

fighters they wanted, didn’t want to fight. Paul was the only one that would

accept that fight. That’s how it came about.

 

AllHipHop.com: In your last few fights, you’ve been opening up

more offensively, and it’s caused your fights to be a lot more exciting. Are you

going to continue that trend against Williams, or try to be more

defensive-minded?

Wright: I’m going to do whatever I have to do. I’m gonna go in there and

be Winky Wright. We’re going to adapt inside the ring [to Paul] and use

whatever works for us.

AllHipHop.com: How has your body been responding to training

since you’re coming off a long layoff and moving back down from 170 to 160

pounds?

Wright: We definitely had to work to get in shape. Like you said, it’s a

different weight class and being out for so long, we had to work hard [Editors Note: During the layoff, Wright was

reported to have weighed as much as 193 pounds]. We’re ready. I’m looking

forward to the opportunity to show the fans what they’ve been missing.

AllHipHop.com: Looking at your career, most people point to

your wins over Shane Mosley and Felix Trinidad as your most dominating

performances. If you had to select one fight for a fight fan that’s never seen

you perform, which bout would it be that epitomizes what Winky Wright is

about in the ring?

Wright: Hmmm. I like my [Julio Cesar] Vasquez fight. A lot of people

didn’t get to see that. It was the first time I fought for a world

championship. [Editors Note: 1994 WBA

junior middleweight title bout]. I fought overseas in France. I had some

shoes that were slippery and really couldn’t keep my balance. And I was still

boxing the light out of him, but every time I would slip and fall they would

call it a knockdown. But it showed the heart and determination I had to keep

fighting and keep digging down to try and win the fight. I thought it was a

great fight for me.

AllHipHop.com: You’ve had some highly disputed decisions that

have gone against you….

Wright: Yes! From Vargas, to Hopkins, to Taylor…a lot of bad decisions!

[laughs]

AllHipHop.com: [laughs] Which one would you say was the worst

and bothers you the most to this day?

Wright: Hmmmm. I would have to say [Fernando] Vargas because of the

timing. I was just coming on the scene and that was a fight that I definitely

won.

AllHipHop.com: Outside of the ring, you have Pound 4 Pound

Records. How are you approaching that endeavor since the music industry is

changing its model of distributing music and artists?

Wright: When I first started my label I, was just trying to get into the

R&B and Rap side. But like you said, it’s so tough out there. I’ve moved my

vision outward. I have this rock band that’s trying to do their thing called

Radio Reset. That’s who we’re backing right now, trying to crossover and get

into that side of the [music] industry.

AllHipHop.com: Your face has been seen in a lot of Hip-Hop

videos over the last 4-5 years. You’ve worked with 50 Cent, Busta Rhymes, Jamie

Foxx, J Prince, and others. When developing your business plan for the label,

did you seek out any of their advice, or was everything done on your own?

Wright: I pretty much did everything by myself. I got good friends in

them guys like you said. They would let me know if I was going in the wrong

direction. I got with Chris Lighty management-wise, so when I need to know something

I can ask him and find the best way of doing it.

AllHipHop.com: A lot of people weren’t aware that you had an

intriguing web-series starring Jadakiss, Jamie Hector, Egypt, and Shyheim

called Winky’s Spot (www.winkysspot.com).

What’s the status of that and the soundtrack you were working on?

Wright: That was a nice little thing that came at the wrong time. The

money ain’t flying around for a lot of new ideas anymore. Winky’s Spot was a

good look, we were trying to do something different. The timing was just bad

with the recession and everything going on.

AllHipHop.com: Speaking of the recession, what is your opinion

on the way boxing has been moving since you’ve been away from the ring?

Wright: The money hasn’t been really hurting boxing. What’s hurting

boxing is not putting the best fighters in with each other. You have certain

individuals, networks, and managements that are working together. They’re

getting advantages over other people that deserve to get fights. These

relationships are getting in the middle of it and preventing the best fights.

That’s why a lot of people are watching MMA and UFC, because they’re just

throwing those guys in there. You want to fight each other? Boom, then fight.

And people pay for what they want to see. But when you put a fighter in with

someone you know he’ll beat, why would you watch it? You know who’s gonna

win.

AllHipHop.com: You’ve been calling out Oscar De La Hoya since

about 1999. Was there ever a point where he actually approached you about a

fight, or has he always brushed you off?

Wright: There was sometimes where he said “he’s looking forward to the

fight.” But it’s never happened yet. He pretty much just dances around the

question. That’s why I mean when you talked about the best fighters out there

[not fighting]. I’m talking about legends that don’t want to fight me. That’s

what causes problems [for boxing].

AllHipHop.com: You have numerous endeavors outside the ring,

along with various legends on your resume. What is driving Winky Wright to

still continue to box at age 37?

Wright: For myself. There’s about two more fighters out here that I

really want to fight. I don’t want to call no names right now. I’ll handle my

business on April 11, and hopefully we’ll get these fighters. And like you’ve

said I’ve accomplished a lot in the boxing game, and then I’ll move on to other

things.

AllHipHop.com: Is boxing promotion a possibility for you?

Wright: Oh yeah. I been had Winky Promotions with my partner Chris

Lighty. The networks are like the rap game. If you don’t know or are not down

with that certain person, it’s going to be hard for you to get into the

limelight. Boxing promotion is the same thing. The networks have been giving

the push to the same old people they’ve always been giving it to. And that keep

things down.

AllHipHop.com: Who do you enjoy watching perform in the ring?

Wright: I like Cotto, little [Andre] Berto. I also like watching [Juan

Manuel] Marquez, those kinds of fighters.

AllHipHop.com: Any closing thoughts?

Wright: I got to run and do this physical [for the fight]. But thank you

man for this.

“… If I may interject/ Rap these days is like a pain up in the neck/ Cornier and phonier than a play fight/”

—MF Doom, “Benzie Box,” The Mouse and the Mask (2005).

“What if I was another corny rapper?/”

—Jadakiss ft. Nas, “What If,” The Last Kiss (2009).

“Rapper-jocks need to put a sock in they chatterbox/ Rappers like the gay club strip tease/With hippies on the yip saying ‘hey, bub grip these’/”

—DOOM, “Microwave Mayo,” Born Like This (2009).

I never took the Joe Budden vs. Saigon battle—beef—seriously. Not because it failed to impress or inspire me (though it did), but I had a hard time in identifying its logic. It always confronted me as a forced and unfortunate circumstance, rather than a genuine, inevitable lyrical onslaught—the kind we saw with Canibus and L.L. (which, by the way, Bis won—quite handily, too), or Jay-z vs. Nas (which… I’ll leave it up to you—the reader). Nas. It struck me as a desperate reincarnation of the Tupac vs. Biggie saga—albeit less thrilling and theatrical. Make no mistake: Tupac and Biggie were never lyrical adversaries. They were both pawns, used by record label Kings—Executives—and each seemed to stumble upon this understanding at a time too late.

It was as though the two legends were unsure, till the very last minute, of which role the other was playing. In an age when every rapper with a nearing album release date is scrambling through the Hip-Hop artist directory, looking for someone to pick a fight with, like school kids, the Budden/Saigon clash failed to strike the chord of uniqueness—even at the incipient.. I call it “unfortunate,” because—it was. I’ll explain.

From the outset, it’s was quite obvious that Saigon and Joe Budden are a match made in Heaven (Ghetto Heaven, perhaps). Both can spit, and are equally vicious lyrical assassins, in their own right. Both are incredibly talented artists, but without the material evidence and exposure to corroborate their talents. Joe Budden and Saigon both rose from relative obscurity to international stardom, through hit singles from mixtapes/albums—(Pump It Up, Joe Budden; Say Yes, Da Yard Father 1 – The Best of Saigon)—without successfully breaking the glass ceiling of mainstream appeal.

Both have, over time, employed socially-conscious undertones in their songs, without coming across as preachy or pretentious. Both have also been caught in between the crosshairs of label politics, and had albums stalled for months and years, as a result. This frustration has led both artists to embark on self-imposed sabbaticals from music-making, while venturing into different fields—short-lived, as they were. As previously mentioned, both have also attained enormous success in the underground community, whilst being overlooked, predominantly, by Hip-Hop’s mainstream listening audience.

With this seemingly endless list of similarities, it was understandable when the thrust of competition and rivalry catapulted both artists to, for the first time in long time, Hip-Hop’s center of attention. One could certainly see how this rare exposure successfully knocked off their focus and discipline, although, there seemed to be no justification for the escalating war of words which, soon enough, began to gain decibel in tonality and aggression.

With threats against family members introduced into the mix, it became obvious that neither of the two artists had any control over the direction the battle was beginning to veer in. Proposals of boxing matches soon confirmed how less a Hip-Hop battle it was, and how more of an ego-trip it appeared to be. Most critical listeners are aware that Hip-Hop artists have a tendency to suffer, greatly, from insufficient self-esteem—which affords their egos enormous opportunities to engage in thoughtless acts. The recent clash between Budden and Saigon’s camp was no different.

Saigon confirmed this in an interview with Sirius Radio’s Angela Yee, last month. With Joe Budden calling in to officially bury the hatchet, Saigon confessed of how “stupid” he felt “through the whole sh**, because that’s not my lane.” He continued:

I’m actually opposed to doing that sh**… On my real album, I got a whole song on why that sh** looks stupid to the public, for us to just tear each other down… We finally make it to a situation where we’re getting out [of] the ghetto, and we’re going to find a reason to try to knock each other down. And it’s a reflection of our community… It’s so easy to try to pull somebody else down, when you see them trying to get ahead.

Saigon also rebuked “the masses,” who, as he put it, would “rather hear about one of us causing physical harm to one another,” than encouraging a strong display of Black unity. Is it too strong to infer that this mass group of people is largely composed of the Hip-Hop media?

That would be a curious assumption, as the Hip-Hop media has been remarkably silent on the reconciliation between Budden and Saigon. I wonder if this has anything to do with its role as provocateurs, during the thick of the fight. Perhaps our media’s giddiness, over two grown men airing out their frustration by attacking each other, revealed a troubling truth about how far we haven’t come since the East vs. West non-wars of the ‘90s. What we do know for sure, is that there are those (writers, label executives, journalists, bankers, agents, informants, govt. officials, listeners, critics, apologists, etc.) who would always find avenues to exploit the competition-centered atmosphere of Hip-Hop, by transforming artistic adversaries into enemies. Canibus once rapped, on “Poet Laureate II” (Rip the Jacker), that “Every warrior has an axe to bury/ But he has to learn to discern between enemy and adversary.”

In a newly-surfaced 2002 interview, Queensbridge veteran, Nas is featured as a one-man wrecking crew against artists, DJs, executives, radio stations, and the Hip-Hop industry at-large. Artists are being “used” as slaves, by corporations, to generate revenue, Nas said. He insisted that his colleagues “got to have balls, and got to let these guys know.” If not, these guys would “take control, and try to say that they have all the power, and… dictate what we [Hip-Hop artists] have to do.”

Nas remonstrated against the ventriloquists who use rappers as puppets and dummies, with ulterior motives of commercial profit: “My fight is a big fight. My fight is against any power structure that’s going to try and hold back freedom of speech. And that fight ain’t over yet… I’m not sitting back, letting the clowns run the rap game. Stop. Today is a new day.” In a separate interview with WBLS’ then-air personality, Deja Vu, around the same time, Nas boldly declared that, “Rappers are slaves.”

If seven years after his comments, we can’t unequivocally contend that these “slaves” are now free, what lies ahead for our beloved culture?

Tolu Olorunda is a Columnist for BlackCommentator.com.