Call it the Unrealized Dream Team.
Of the 12 U.S. boxers who came here searching for gold at the Olympics, only three medaled, and only one of those-Oscar De La Hoya-found the gold.
Bad breaks accounted for part of the showing, the worst by a U.S. team since 1948.
Eric Griffin was defeated by a computer, Montell Griffin by a referee and Vernon Forrest by a hamburger, which upset his stomach.
But the snake-bit theory goes only so far.
U.S. head coach Joe Byrd, who had predicted four gold and ”seven or eight” total medals, was reassessing his forecast as early as the second round, when only seven of his fighters remained in the competition.
What went wrong?
There were three principal factors in the disappointing performance:
– Cuba.
– The relatively short training period for the team, which was not selected until late June.
– The wooing of the boxers by professional promoters, which served to distract the young athletes from their Olympic goals, U.S. officials say.
Of those three factors, the biggest was the tiny island of Cuba.
Competing against the Americans in the Olympics for the first time since 1976, the Cubans won nine medals, including seven golds. They were 4-0 against U.S. fighters.
”The results speak for themselves,” said Alcides Sargarra, Cuba`s boxing coach. ”This proves that the Cuban boxing school is running at a high level.”
Four Cubans fought Sunday. Three won.
Light-welterweight Hector Vinent smothered Canadian Mark Leduc 11-1. Juan Carlos Lemus, the world light-middleweight champion, outscored Orhan Delibas of the Netherlands 6-1. Super-heavyweight Roberto Balado, a two-time world champion, finished off Nigerian Richard Igbineghu 13-2.
”The Cuban team is good because we train a lot and are well prepared,”
said Vinent through an interpreter. ”I train 4 1/2 hours every day.”
The only Cuban to lose Sunday was flyweight Raul Gonzalez. But it took last year`s world runner-up, Chol Su Choi of North Korea, to beat him 12-2.
”They`re very strong, and they`ve been fighting for years,” said U.S. middleweight Chris Byrd, who lost to Ariel Hernandez in the gold-medal match Saturday. ”They`re like pros.”
Cuba, a country of about 10 million, boasts 16,000 amateur boxers, only 6,000 less than the United States, which is roughly 20 times larger.
”Cuba is small, but it is still part of the world, and we are prepared to show the world how good we can be,” said Raul Villanueve, an official with the Cuban Ministry of Sports. ”We have 35 sports in Cuba, but boxing is the most popular.”
The U.S. boxers fared poorly in these Games, but will the Americans ever be competitive with the Cubans?
”The fighters in Cuba have been competing for years and years, and they have a permanent coaching staff,” said Jerry Dusenberry, the vice president of USA Boxing. ”That`s the main reason they`re so strong. And that`s fine for a state-driven society, but in a culture like the U.S., that`s not feasible, because we want to give new kids a chance to compete every four years.”
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But if the Cuban system has built-in advantages that help make it such a powerful force in boxing, Joe Byrd said the United States can bridge the gap by selecting its boxing team earlier, thus giving the coaching staff more time to work with the boxers.
”We had the trials in mid-June and the boxoffs in late June,” Byrd said. ”Then it was off to Ft. Bragg, N.C., for training camp, and then here for the Olympics. Everything was rush, rush, rush. You need more time to work with a team physically and mentally.”
Byrd said he would like to see the team selected at least a month earlier for the 1992 Olympics.
”That`s a possibility, and I agree that it would help,” said Dusenberry. ”But you have to remember that the trials and boxoffs are televised, and that`s a major source of our income. Unfortunately, to a large extent, television dictates when those events will be held. The bottom line prevails.”
The bottom line also seems to prevail among the amateur boxers, many of whom were-and are-being wooed by professional boxing promoters.
In the trials and boxoffs, some of the fighters were coached by professional trainers, including light-middleweight Raul Marquez, who had Lou Duva in his corner.
”It`s all right for the pros to train the boxers in the gyms back home and in the tournaments leading up to the Olympics,” said Jay Miller, a publicist for USA Boxing. ”The only thing they can`t do is sign them to a professional contract.”
Duva, who co-trains undisputed heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield, could not train Marquez at the Games because of USA Boxing restrictions, but he was up in the stands, shouting instructions to the boxer, who seemed so distracted that he tried to pick out Duva between rounds.
”Let`s be quite candid,” Dusenberry said. ”The professional promoters and trainers are doing a real disservice to the athletes in our national team effort. I know they have business propositions for the athletes, and I know they will probably do a fine job for them when they sign them later on, but I think sometimes the kids are so preoccupied with their professional futures that they forget about their goals at the Olympics.”
Byrd, who was upset by the presence of the professional trainers in the arena, said they should not be allowed to work the corners in the trials or boxoffs, either.
”The kids get comfortable with their own coaches, and then they have to switch to the U.S. head coach for the Olympics,” Byrd said. ”It`s very inconsistent.”
The United States has four years in which to deal with such inconsistencies.
”We certainly want to improve our showing at the Olympics,” Dusenberry said. ”And we`ll do whatever we can to do that. But we also have to remember that the rest of the world is catching up with the United States.”