The late Vernon Forrest was honored today in his adopted Atlanta hometown via the Vernon Forrest Memorial Golf Tournament.
The money raised by the event will be distributed to three sources: the boxer’s family, and two youth boxing programs in the city.
Forrest was killed in July 2009 during a botched car-jacking at a gas station. The three would-be robbers are in custody and awaiting death-penalty trials.
At the time of his death, Forrest had just earned revenge in a rematch with Sergio Mora to pick up the WBC junior-middleweight title. His manager Charles Watson told the Atlanta Journal Constitution that Forrest had mapped out a closing three fight plan against Sergio Martinez, Kelly Pavlik, and Paul Williams.
“That was it; he was going to hang them up,” said Watson of Forrest’s 16 year professional career. “He had a lot he wanted to do in life…It’s been tough to get over, but we’re trying to look at some ways to do some of the things he’d want us to do.”
Vernon Forrest was 38 years old at the time of his death. His final record is 41-3, 29 KOs.
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July 25, 2009 was a very sad day in Atlanta. I remember vividly waking up that morning to find out Forrest had been just a few blocks up the street from my own residence.
Having already penned an obituary for Alexis Arguello and having to cover the bizarre “suicide” of Arturo Gatti, I spent the rest of that afternoon in a daze writing up a final tribute to Vernon that posted on AllHipHop.com.
How would an aged but crafty veteran like the Viper matched up at 154 against Paul Williams, Kermit Cintron, Alfredo Angulo or Sergei Dzinziruk? Those questions will now be forever confined to mythical matchups.
In a final somber note, Floyd Mayweather had informed me last year that he had been close to bringing Forrest to his own Mayweather Promotions as an attraction on his undercards.
“I was with Vernon in training 48 hours before he got killed,” Mayweather said last August. “What I feel so bad about is that we were working on signing Vernon Forrest to Mayweather Promotions.”
RIP Vernon. And may your killers feel the full wrath of the legal system.
Beats, Boxing and Mayhem 