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Champ (4)
UNDEFEATED CRUISERWEIGHT JEAN Pierre Augustin of Lawrence, Mass., makes his Rhode Island and CES Boxing debut on Friday, April 3, 2015 when he faces Solomon Maye of New Haven, Conn., on the undercard of "The Revival," presented by CES Boxing. Augustin is now trained by former five-time world champion Vinny Paz and managed by award-winning film producer Chad Verdi, both of whom he met while playing a role in the upcoming movie, Bleed For This, based on Paz's legendary career.
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Film producer Verdi, boxing champ Paz team up with unbeaten New England prospect Augustin |
LINCOLN, R.I. (March 19th, 2015) -- The phone call couldn't have come at a better time for Jean Pierre Augustin, even if he wasn't quite sure it was real.
"I didn't take it seriously at first," said the Lawrence, Mass., cruiserweight boxer. "I thought it was a prank."
But this was no joke. This was the opportunity of a lifetime, a chance for the 27-year-old fighter to play a role in Bleed For This, the upcoming Chad Verdi-produced film based on the career of five-time world champion Vinny Paz.
Augustin (4-0, 2 KOs) landed the role of former world champ Gilbert Dele, whom Paz beat in 1991, and made a lasting impression on the cast and crew, specifically Verdi and Paz, who are now guiding Augustin's boxing career, which resumes Friday, April 3rd, 2015 at Twin River Casino on the undercard of "The Revival," presented by CES Boxing in association with Verdi Productions.
Tickets for Augustin's Twin River and CES debut are priced at $40.00, $100.00 and $125.00 and available for purchase online atwww.cesboxing.com or www.twinriver.com, by phone at 401-724-2253/2254 or at the Twin River Players Club. All fights and fighters are subject to change.
"This is a blessing for me," Augustin said. "There's no other way for me to describe it."
"Vinny is 100 percent committed to training JP and making him a world champion," Verdi said. "This is the main reason I agreed to become JP's manager, and working with Vinny again is an absolute joy. Both Vinny and I feel JP has what it takes to become a champion, but it's up to him to put in all the hard work and dedication needed."
That part is nothing new for Augustin, who, with few connections on the local boxing circuit, needed the help of a sponsor at the beginning of his pro career just to pay his way onto various cards in West Virginia and North Carolina, where he amassed a 4-0 record with two first-round knockouts in 2014.
But the money from fighting wasn't enough to pay the bills, so the Haitian-born Augustin found other ways to earn a living, working as a plumber, security guard and even a part-time Uber driver.
"I really didn't know where my career was going," he said. "I was basically living out of a suitcase moving from camp to camp, hustling here and there to get a job done and get some cash.
"I was pursuing a dream, but the dream really wasn't taking me anywhere."
Raised in Boston before moving to Lawrence at the age of 10, Augustin's first love was martial arts, but it wasn't "physical enough," so, on the recommendation of his sensei, he took up boxing at a local gym.
"I instantly fell in love with it," he said.
After 55 amateur fights (49 wins among them), Augustin finally turned pro in February of 2014. The struggle to land a spot on a card in New England with other promoters - "I just couldn't get a fair shake," he said - forced Augustin to remain a boxing nomad until he linked up with Verdi and Paz on the set for Bleed For This.
The rest is history. With Verdi as his manager, Paz as his trainer, and CES president Jimmy Burchfield Sr. as his promoter, Augustin now has an opportunity to build a fan base in New England and take his career to new heights. The journey begins April 3rd in a four-round bout against New Haven, Conn., vet Solomon Maye (1-4).
"Things have been unfolding quickly," said Augustin, who has been training and sparring at Balletto's Gym in Providence while also working with Rhode Island-based coach Vic Fagnant. "It's not overwhelming, but it's a lot to process.
"I'm just thankful for this opportunity."
"The Revival" features the 10-round main event between Universal Boxing Federation (UBF) female super bantamweight world championShelly Vincent (13-0, 1 KO) of Providence and three-time world-title challenger Christina Ruiz (7-7-3, 4 KOs) of San Antonio, Tex. Both Vincent's UBF title and the vacant International Boxing Association (IBA) world title will be on the line.
Unbeaten Providence super middleweight Angel Camacho Jr. (13-0, 4 KOs) faces the dangerous Chris Chatman (12-4-1, 5 KOs) of Jersey City, N.J., in the six-round co-feature, while undefeated welterweight Nick DeLomba (6-0) of Cranston, R.I., battles Hartford, Conn., vet Joe Wilson Jr. (3-1) in a six-round special attraction.
Bleed For This is the inspirational true story of Rhode Island's Paz, who defied the odds by winning the third of his five world titles just one year after a near-fatal car crash left him with a broken neck and an uncertain future.
Executive produced by Martin Scorsece, Michelle Verdi andJoshua Sason and produced by Verdi, Bruce Cohen, Emma Tillinger Koskoff, Pam Thur and Noah Kraft, Bleed For This starsMiles Teller (The Spectacular Now, That Awkward Moment andGeneration X) as Paz; Golden Globe nominee Aaron Eckhart (The Dark Knight, Olympus Has Fallen, I and Frankenstein) as trainerKevin Rooney; Katey Sagal (Married ... With Children, Sons Of Anarchy) as Louise Pazienza; and Ciaran Hinds (Frozen, Munich,The Road to Perdition and Harry Potter) as Angelo Pazienza.
The undercard of "The Revival" also features several noteworthy regional showdowns, including a four-round junior welterweight bout between unbeaten Worcester, Mass., native Freddy Sanchez (3-0, 2 KOs) and Briam Granado (1-0, 1 KO) of New Bedford, Mass., and a four-round super middleweight bout between Zachary Christy (1-0-1) of Warwick, R.I. (St. Petersburg, Fla.), and former amateur champion Bobby Flynn of Sandwich, Mass., who is making his professional boxing debut. New Bedford junior middleweight Ray Oliveira Jr. (3-0, 2 KOs) returns to face Cambridge, Mass., newcomer Yves Thevenin while unbeaten middleweight prospectKhiary Gray-Pitts (5-0, 3 KOs) of Worcester battles New Haven vetGreg McCoy (3-4-1, 1 KO).
For more information on "The Revival" visit www.cesboxing.com, follow @CESBOXING on Twitter and Instagram and "like" the official CES Boxing Facebook fan page.
- CES -
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CES photo by Ian Barnard
REIGNING NEW ENGLAND Light Heavyweight champion Rich Gingras of Lincoln, R.I., will face UBF Northeast champion Joey McCreedy in the main event of CES Boxing's "Title For Title" card Friday, Sept. 12, 2014 at Twin River Casino. Both belts will be on the line in the eight-round bout as Gingras fights for a title for the second time in his last three fights.
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Former two-time world champion Glen "The Road Warrior" Johnson (above right), seen here knocking out Allan Green during their Super Six World Classic super middleweight bout in 2010, will return to the ring Friday, Feb. 21st, 2014 at Twin River Casino in Lincoln, R.I., in the 8-round main event of CES' "Home Sweet Home" card as he faces fan-favorite Jaime Velazquez.
Former champ Johnson invades Rhode Island Feb. 21st
Providence's Toka Kahn will return to his hometown and put his unbeaten record on the line on the undercard of CES' Feb. 21st event at Twin River Casino. Providence's Toka Kahn
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (Feb. 11th, 2014) -- The man who once put Roy Jones Jr. to sleep and earned a reputation as boxing's toughest "Road Warrior" will test his luck in another city far from his home in Jamaica.
Glen Johnson, the former International Boxing Federation (IBF) and The Ring world light heavyweight champion, will headline Classic Entertainment & Sports' Feb. 21, 2014 card at Twin River Casino in Lincoln, R.I., when he faces veteran Jaime Velazquez of Pawtucket, R.I., in the 8-round main event of "Home Sweet Home."
Velazquez (11-5-2, 6 KOs), 42, a former New England title contender in the mid- to late-1990s, will end a 15-year layoff in his long-awaited return to the ring Feb. 21st, and he'll do it against one of the most prolific light heavyweights of this generation. Johnson (53-18-2, 36 KOs), 45, has been actively fighting for the past 25 years, a late-bloomer who didn't turn pro until he was 20, but during that stretch he's fought 11 world-title bouts and enjoyed an impressive run as the IBF and The Ring title-holder, which included his shocking knockout win over Roy Jones Jr. in 2004. Three months later, Johnson unified the light heavyweight title by beating Antonio Tarver and earned the Boxing Writer's Association of America's Fighter of the Year award.
Tickets for "Home Sweet Home" are available for $40, $100 and $126 (VIP) and can be purchased online at www.cesboxing.com or www.twinriver.com or by phone at 401-724-2253/2254.
Nicknamed "The Road Warrior" for frequently fighting -- and winning -- in his opponents' hometowns, Johnson's resume also includes a knockout win over the hard-hitting Yusaf Mack of Philadelphia and an inclusion in the Super Six World Boxing Classic in which he dropped to 168 pounds to replace an injured Mikkel Kessler and knocked out Allan Green before losing a close majority decision to World Boxing Council (WBC) champ Carl Froch in the semifinals.
Like the loss to Froch, many of Johnson's setbacks have either been too close to call or have fallen under a cloud of controversy, including a disputed draw against Clinton Woods for the then-vacant IBF title in 2003 in Woods' backyard in the United Kingdom, which Johnson avenged later that year by beating Woods unanimously for the belt. He faced Woods a third time in 2006 in the same country for the same belt and lost a close split decision in which one judge awarded the fight to Johnson by two points.
Following the trilogy with Woods, Johnson went on to beat former world champion Montell Griffin by 11th-round knockout and faced off twice against WBC title-holder Chad Dawson, losing both fights by narrow unanimous decisions. Johnson also challenged for the IBF title a third time against Tavoris Cloud and took a shot at the IBF super middleweight belt against Lucian Bute, going the distance against both fighters. Johnson pushed Cloud to the brink for 12 rounds and lost a unanimous decision despite landing more punches than Cloud, according to the CompuBox numbers.
In addition to knocking out 36 of his 73 opponents, a staggering 49 percent knockout rate, Johnson has only been stopped once in 25 years, proving his chin is as solid as his fists. The lone stoppage occurred in 1997 in the first of his 11 world-title belts against then-IBF middleweight champ Bernard Hopkins, the ageless wonder who, at 49, now holds the same light heavyweight title Johnson defended twice during the peak of his dominance in 2004. Born in Jamaica, Johnson moved to southern Florida at the age of 15.
Velazquez is best known for a series of memorable bouts on the New England circuit in the '90s, including a thriller against former world-title challenger Scott Pemberton and a six-round battle against Richard Grant, who later went on to face former super middleweight world champ Jeff Lacy. Velazquez also went the distance with former IBF contender Gabriel Hernandez and fought two draws against Holyoke, Mass., cruiserweight Darren Whitley.
"Home Sweet Home" also features the homecoming of Providence native Toka Kahn (9-0, 6 KOs), a highly-decorated amateur and now undefeated super featherweight prospect fighting under the promotional guidance of Bob Arum's Top Rank Boxing. Kahn will fight in his hometown for the first time since 2012 in a six-round bout.
"The Vermont Bully" Kevin Cobbs (7-1, 2 KOs), now fighting out of Fall River, Mass., will end his year-long layoff in a four-round light heavyweight bout while Pawtucket, R.I., middleweight Thomas Falowo (10-2, 7 KOs) will return for the first time since his loss to Chris Chatman in July of 2012 in a separate six-round bout. The undercard also features the return of undefeated Providence middleweight K.J. Harrison-Lombardi (4-0-1), who will star in a four-round bout, and the Twin River debut of Louisiana cruiserweight Alvin Varmall (1-0, 1 KO), also fighting in a separate four-round bout. All fights and fighters are subject to change.
-- CES