Free Becoming Holyfield by Evander Holyfield Page A

finished yet.” Novicic was holding up fingers to indicate the count, and when he was done he grabbed Kevin and moved him back to the corner. The New Zealander was done for and the crowd was in near-hysterics. I’d just made a contribution to the American boxing effort with a semifinal win, and a gold medal in the finals was all but assured.
    It’s not my style to celebrate openly. I don’t do victory dances and I don’t gloat, especially not when another guy is feeling like his whole world just caved in, and I didn’t do it then. Celebration would come later, in private with my teammates, after I took care of the Yugoslavian in the finals and had that gold medal around my neck.
    But there was another thought that I have to confess was running through my head, a very selfish one. I was thinking, “Don’t stop the fight! Let him continue, don’t stop the fight!” Because Kevin had gotten up before the end of the count, it wouldn’t be scored as a knockout. It was the ref’s decision to stop the fight because of Kevin’s condition, so it would only be a TKO. I thought, “The guy’s been hanging on to me practically nonstop and you didn’t give him a third and final warning, so don’t stop us now! Let me knock him out!”
    But I saw that it was hopeless. As Kevin hung his head and headed back to the corner, Novicic held his hand toward the judges, palm down, telling them not to bother with any more scoring. Then he turned around and came toward me. As he got closer he waved his fingers at me and I started forward to meet him in the middle of the ring, expecting him to send me back to my own corner.
    But he didn’t do that. He started making hand signals at me, and said, “When I say stop, you stop,” or something close to that, like a schoolteacher scolding a child. What was the point of that? I just scored a decisive victory and I needed a shower, not a lecture. I had trouble catching all of it, especially with the crowd still screaming and clapping, and Novicic’s English wasn’t that good to begin with, but I did understand his last word before he turned away: “Disqualified!”
    Disqualified? He couldn’t possibly be serious. Had he actually expected me to reel back in a punch that was already on its way?
    I remember exactly what I was thinking: “This is America. He can’t do this. We’ll get it straightened out.”
    As I went back to my corner Novicic went ahead of me, leaned over the ropes and said something to the judges. Before he’d even gotten two words out, Coach Nappy realized what was going on and took off along the ropes like a ballistic missile, screaming at the ref all the way. Sanders had to go after him and pull him back, which was about the time I realized that we weren’t going to get it straightened out, and it’s also when the crowd caught on to what was happening. The cheers began turning to boos, and very soon the booing got ugly.
    There are a lot of clichés for a moment like that—the wind going out of your sails, a pin popping your balloon, the rug getting pulled out from under you—and you know what? Every one of them is dead-on accurate. That’s exactly what it feels like, all rolled into one. I felt physically ill, dizzy, and so blown away I couldn’t think straight. The only thought I could hang on to was the same one I’d had earlier: “This is America. He can’t do this.”
    All those months of training and dreaming crashed into me like a multicar pileup. If somebody stronger, more talented and better conditioned had whupped me, all right then, I could live with that. I might not like it but at least it would make sense. I’d go back home, train harder and do better next time.
    But what would I do now? I’d dominated this fight from the opening bell, knocked Kevin down, been ahead on all five cards and then dropped him