J.B. Williamson Keeps the Prince From the Crown

J.B. Williamson, with an entourage that recalled the invasion of Normandy, stormed Prince Mameh Mohammed for the vacant World Boxing Council light-heavyweight title at the Forum Tuesday night. It wasn’t exactly the Gorilla War Fare that the former Marine’s robe proclaimed. In fact, it wouldn’t have passed for much beyond big-time wrestling. But, let it be said, he did win the battle.

Williamson, ranked No. 3 by the WBC, had no trouble at all with Mohammed, the self-proclaimed heir to King Issah Mohammed’s kingdom in Ghana. The Prince, possibly reminded of all those coups his dad had to contend with, seemed confused and off-balance for nearly all the 12 scheduled rounds.

Though Prince Valiant throughout, the No. 2 contender never once threatened Williamson’s personal safety. The judges were unanimous in their decision. Marty Sammon and Dr. James Jen-Kin both scored it 117-111, and Dick Young scored it 116-112.

Williamson, who came to Los Angeles to fight after an amateur career in Indianapolis and a military career here and there, never exactly hurt the prince, for that matter. He did more wrestling than Sgt. Slaughter, who shares his wardrobe. But he never hurts anybody. Now 22-1, he still has only eight knockouts.

Nevertheless, he was the busier and more active fighter, although he certainly didn’t recall Michael Spinks, the man he succeeds. Williamson, 173, scored no knockdowns, but he did at least hurt the prince with his attacks to the body. After one hook to the body in the sixth round, the course of the fight seemed determined. The prince seemed rubber-legged thereafter.

Afterward, the prince, 171 1/2, suggested that he had overtrained and should never have come in so light to fight for the 175-pound title that was vacated by former undisputed champion, Spinks.

“Today is my bad luck,” the prince said apologetically. “I shall try again.”

Prince complained, like many of the fans who booed from ringside, that Williamson did more close-dancing than Fred Astaire ever did. “What I see, is not what I expected,” he said. “All he did was spin and swerve me, just pivot me all around. I did not expect comedy or rock and roll. Fighters come to throw the punches and see who hits who. I’m not used to rock and roll boxing.”

For the prince, 27, who has fought here exclusively at the Forum the last several years, it was a bitter defeat. He had been close in the past to big money fights with Spinks but that was before Spinks unexpectedly toppled heavyweight champion Larry Holmes. The title elimination bout produced just $45,000 for each fighter, but the title itself has commercial potential. And now the prince, if not quite a pauper, is just one more contender.

Williamson, 28, may be no more flashier in the ring than the prince--both seemed awkward enough to make a Rocky movie look like a documentary--but his garb was more impressive. He favors the camouflage look and he and his handlers looked like they had just raided, if not Iwo Jima, an Army surplus store. To top it off, Williamson wore a cape fashioned out of an American flag.

This, presumably, pointed out the patriotic angle, especially as the prince still considers his homeland to be in Ghana. African attire was the order of the day for his corner and a small contingent of his fans banged drums.

The fight itself turned out to be something of a letdown, although nobody expected a slugfest. The prince numbers only 16 knockouts in his record of 32-2-2. Still, the unorthodoxy of the fighters, the prince especially, did not seem to permit anything resembling the sweet science. There was indeed a lot of clinching. And neither fighter was particularly accurate.

Later Williamson, who once sparred with Marvin Johnson, the man fighting for the other half of Spinks’ vacated title (he is matched with Leslie Stewart later in February), started talking of unifying the title, just as Spinks had done. Certainly he was encouraged by his latest outing.

“I thought he was going to put up a better fight,” Williamson said of the prince, “but maybe I underestimated my own talent.”

But he better not overestimate it, either, unless the prince is his idea of ring royalty. There are light-heavyweights, retired and perhaps immobile, who may have been inspired to ring re-entry by Tuesday night’s fight.