Gil Clancy told me to move around for six or seven rounds, but when you're a puncher and you catch someone, you got after them. And in that fight [with George Foreman in 1999] my timing was off and I got caught.

A lot of the athletes moved away from boxing, into UFC - which I think is really crazy, where they elbow to the head and knee to the jaw. I think that's really a barbaric sport - but boxing is coming back.

Growing up training, I use to get up so early I would wave to the garbage men going by. So, I had this relationship with Blue Collar America and I really liked it. I felt that lots of those people looked forward to me winning.

I was a small kid from Huntington, Long Island. I never imagined that anything like that would happen to me.

I am seeing all the guys, like Earnie Shavers, Tex Cobb, and Larry Holmes all the time.

If you look at my career, towards the end you will see I was fighting like once a year. I was not part of the Don King top heavyweights, so I was kind of kept out. His guys were getting three to four fights a year and I could only get one.

All of the sports have a safety net, but boxing is the only sport that has none. So when the fighter is through, he is through. While he was fighting his management was very excited for him, but now that he is done, that management team is moving on.