Hey Fight fans!
This week our subject is former heavyweight contender and generally strange/dangerous guy, Ike Ibeabuchi. Born February 2, 1973, in Isuochi, Nigeria, Ike “The President” Ibeabuchi stood six foot two inches tall and weighed a solid two hundred thirty some odd pounds. After success as an amateur in his native Nigeria, Ibeabuchi came to the USA and fought out of the Dallas, Texas gym of former welterweight great turned trainer, Curtis Cokes.
Ibeabuchi was on the winning end of one of the greatest heavyweight fights of the last thirty years. Together with slugger David Tua, Ibeabuchi set a compubox record for punches thrown in a heavyweight contest (Ibeabuchi set the record for most thrown by a heavy). Ibeabuchi was an action heavyweight with lots of punches in his arsenal and the aggressiveness to land them. He went on to stop Chris Byrd at a time when Byrd was one of the best heavyweights in the division and Ibeabuchi was on course to challenge Lennox Lewis in a super-fight for the heavyweight championship.
Ibeabuchi was involved in several disturbing criminal incidents before the sexual assault to which he accepted an Alford Plea and was eventually incarcerated. Before that he kidnapped his own son from an estranged girlfriend and, with the young man in the passenger seat, Ibeabuchi drove his car at high speed into a bridge abutment. The boy was permanently disabled and Ike was sentenced to 120 days in jail for kidnapping. After the win over Byrd, Ibeabuchi was involved in another incident at the Mirage Hotel when an in-room entertainer claimed she was sexually assaulted by Ibeabuchi. He then locked himself in the hotel bathroom and when police arrived he had to be forcibly removed by being pepper-sprayed under the door.
It was a long time before Ibeabuchi was finally deemed fit to stand trial and was sentenced to prison. He was released in November of twenty-fifteen and there were rumors he was going to return to boxing and fight Andy Ruiz on the undercard of the Manny Pacquiao-Tim Bradley rematch but that never panned out. And in April of twenty-sixteen he was arrested for parole violation and is currently being held pending sentence or deportation.
Professional ring record of Ike Ibeabuchi
