MONTREAL - It's not like being slugged by Bernard Hopkins, but it had to hurt.

Former world boxing champ Jean Pascal has turned over his Mercedes-Benz to a friend after losing a bet on the Super Bowl.

While he may be down, he's not out — he's only giving up the car for a month.

The Montreal boxer bet on the New England Patriots, but they went down to defeat when the New York Giants scored the winning touchdown in yesterday's nailbiter.

The former light heavyweight boxing champ's angst is all laid out on his Twitter feed.

If that weren't enough, friends have posted video of him turning over the keys.

There's also a picture of him grabbing his head and rocking back on the couch in disappointment as he watched the TV images of the Giants winning their claim to football supremacy.

But Pascal, who lost his title to Hopkins last year, is taking his latest drubbing well.

He says he still has his Range Rover — and adds he won't be making any similar bets again.

SAN ANTONIO (AP)—Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. retained the WBC middleweight title Saturday night, earning a unanimous decision over fellow Mexican Marco Antonio Rubio.

The judges scored the bout 118-110, 116-112 115-113 for Chavez, which drew a mixed reaction from the 14,120 in attendance Saturday at the Alamodome.

Neither fighter went down despite taking continuous heavy blows to the head and body throughout the 12-round bout.

Chavez (45-0-1-1) overcame a gutsy performance by Rubio (53-6-1) despite having some trouble entering the fight.

Chavez, who hails from Culiacan, struggled to make weight for the championship bout and was arrested on drunken driving charges Jan. 22 in Los Angeles.

“He wasn’t as tough as I thought he would be,” Chavez said. “I felt good about myself the whole fight. I felt a lot stronger than him. He never hurt me in the fight. I felt his punches, but he never hurt me.”

The fighters spent most of the bout standing shoulder to shoulder, which resulted in a couple of head butts and two warnings to Rubio for low blows. Although Chavez won handily on the scorecard, many of the closely contested rounds could have been scored either way.

“He was too heavy for me,” Rubio said. “I couldn’t handle his weight. It was body to body. It was too much for me to handle.”

Chavez landed 237 of 560 punches thrown and Rubio landed 201 of 962.

The boxers exchanged a series of vicious blows in the 11th, with Rubio appearing to daze Chavez with a couple of overhand rights midway through the round. Chavez kept pressing forward despite the blows in the hardest fought round of the bout.

Nonito Donaire dominated the co-main event, winning a 12-round split decision over Wilfredo Vazquez Jr. to win the WBO junior featherweight title.

Donaire (28-1), making his debut in the 122-pound weight class, won 117-110 on two scorecards and lost the third 115-112.

The “Filipino Flash” controlled the bout despite breaking his left hand somewhere between the second and fourth rounds before a crowd of 14,120.

After capturing world titles in the flyweight, super flyweight and bantamweight divisions, Donaire proved just as powerful in moving up to junior featherweight.

Vasquez (21-2-1) went down in the ninth, staggered by a left uppercut before being dropped by a left overhand. Vasquez rose quickly, smiling as the referee came over to give him a standing eight-count.

Donaire also stunned Vazquez in the third with a left-handed uppercut to the right temple.

NOTES: Former world champion Julio Cesar Chavez was at ringside, providing Spanish color commentary for Donaire’s bout before watching his son’s fight as a spectator. Among those in attendance were former world champions “Sugar” Shane Mosley of Golden Boy Promotions and San Antonio native “Jesse” James Leija.

SAN ANTONIO (AP)—Nonito Donaire took a spit decision against Wilfredo Vazquez of Puerto Rico to win the WBO junior featherweight title Saturday at the Alamodome.

Philippines-born Donaire (28-1), making his debut in the weight class, won 117-110 on two scorecards and lost 115-112. He controlled the bout despite breaking his left hand somewhere between the second and fourth rounds before a crowd of 14,120.

After capturing world titles in the flyweight, super flyweight and bantamweight divisions, Donaire proved just as powerful in moving up to junior featherweight.

Vasquez (21-2-1) went down in the ninth, staggered by a left uppercut before being dropped by a left overhand. Vasquez rose quickly, smiling as the referee came over to give him a standing eight-count.

Donaire also stunned Vazquez in the third with a left-handed uppercut to the right temple.

FRANKFURT, Germany (AP)—Yoan Pablo Hernandez of Cuba successfully defended his IBF cruiserweight title with a unanimous decision against Steve Cunningham in their rematch on Saturday.

The southpaw twice had Cunningham on the canvas in the fourth round after catching the American with lefts. Cunningham remained unsteady after receiving a count but somehow recovered to see out the round.

Hernandez tried to finish him off in the fifth, but Cunningham sent him reeling back.

Cunningham improved in the later rounds but was unable to make up for the knockdown. The judges awarded it 116-110, 116-110 and 115-111.

“He really is a courageous boxer, you could see that,” Hernandez said. “I gave myself a bit of breathing space in the fourth round. I caught him again nicely in the 12th.”

Hernandez was making his first defense of the title he won from Cunningham on a controversial split technical decision in October.

That bout was stopped after six rounds after Hernandez sustained two cuts from a clash of heads, and awarded to the Cuban on points.

Hernandez, based in Germany since 2005, improved his record to 26-1 (13 KOs), while Cunningham dropped to 24-4 (12 KOs).

Cunningham, who was aiming to win back the title for the third time, paid tribute to Hernandez for a deserved win and said he had no plans to retire.

SPRINGFIELD, N.J. (AP)—Wayne Kelly, a boxing referee who officiated several notable bouts, has died. He was 63.

The International Boxing Federation said Kelly died Wednesday from a heart attack.

Kelly’s career spanned more than two decades. He was remembered best for officiating the first fight between Riddick Bowe and Andrew Golota. He also officiated several IBF/USBA title fights including Wladimir Klitschko vs. Sultan Ibrigamov and Arturo Gatti vs. Wilson Rodriguez.

Kelly was a Vietnam War Veteran. In lieu of flowers, the Kelly family is suggesting a donation be made in his memory to the Vietnam Veterans of America.

Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. comes from boxing royalty. His father is widely regarded as one of the 20 greatest fighters in the sport’s history and the best ever to emerge from talent-laden Mexico.

When Chavez Jr. turned professional in 2003, he wasn’t what Bruce Trampler, the Hall of Fame matchmaker from Top Rank, would call a real fighter.

He had talent, though, at first, it was only Trampler who saw it. Because of his father’s success, the young Chavez grew up a rich and pampered kid who didn’t have to work for anything he got. That usually isn’t the way a world-class fighter is developed.

And when the young Chavez became a pro, he trained when he felt like. More often than not, when he didn’t feel like it, he’d go through the motions or he’d skip working out entirely.

Trampler said that one time he drove nearly four hours from Top Rank’s Las Vegas offices up the windy treacherous mountain road to get to Big Bear Lake, Calif., where the young Chavez was preparing for a fight. Trampler, one of the wisest boxing minds in the sport’s history, wanted to get a feel for where Chavez was.

When he arrived, he found that the training session was canceled, with Chavez tucked into his bed watching cartoons.

“What I saw was what had been going on for a while with him and what it was really the product of him being a spoiled rich kid,” Trampler said.

Trampler isn’t the type to put up with spoiled rich kids, even one whose father is one of the greatest fighters who ever lived.

He became determined to take Chavez to the Wild Card Gym in Hollywood, Calif., to see trainer Freddie Roach put Manny Pacquiao through the paces. Pacquiao, regarded by many as the best fighter alive, has a notoriously great work ethic.

[ Related: Giants RB preps for second career in boxing ]

Chavez resisted though, until one day when Trampler caught him at the Wilshire Grand Hotel in Los Angeles. Chavez and his girlfriend exited a bank of elevators at one end. At the same time, Trampler exited one on the opposite end.

Chavez saw Trampler, but made like he didn’t, turned to his right and attempted to scoot away. But being so close to Roach, Pacquiao and the Wild Card, Trampler wasn’t going to give up. He turned and went around the back of the elevator and grabbed Chavez.

“I saw him and I said, ‘You little [expletive],’ and I grabbed him, and he said, ‘Oh, Bruce! Hello! I didn’t see you,’ ” Trampler recalled. “I told him I was taking him to the Wild Card. He didn’t want to go, but I said, ‘You’re going,’ and I dragged him into the car and took him.”

And that chance meeting by the elevators may have changed the young man’s life.

He’s now the World Boxing Council middleweight champion, is trained by Roach and will defend his belt against Marco Antonio Rubio on Saturday in San Antonio, Texas, at the Alamodome, the same building where his father fought Pernell Whitaker in 1993 in one of the epic bouts of the last quarter century.

And though there are still plenty of doubters about whether Chavez is the real thing, Roach is no longer among them. Roach, who will be inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in June, not only has become convinced that Chavez is a world-class fighter, but he believes he’s good enough to take on the recognized top middleweight, Sergio Martinez, in his next fight.

Martinez is ranked third in the Yahoo! Sports boxing poll and is regarded by most as several classes above Chavez.

“Martinez is very athletic, and he has a lot of that going for him, but he’s just an average boxer, not a great boxer,” Roach said. “[Antonio] Margarito knocked him out and Margarito is just a tough guy, but he’s hardly a great boxer. Sergio is better now than he was then, but Julio is so much better, too.

“Sergio’s got that athleticism, but Julio is a better boxer. He understands boxing. He’s been around it his whole life and he has that grittiness and toughness you see. I have no problem putting Julio in with Sergio in his next fight.”

[Also: Legendary corner man Angelo Dundee dies ]

The commonly held perception of Chavez was that he is among boxing’s most protected fighters. He had only a handful of amateur fights, and Trampler pointed out that most of his early professional fights were, in essence, on-the-job training.

Chavez, who turns 26 on Feb. 16, is 44-0-1 with 31 knockouts. But, like Greg Haugen once said before fighting Chavez Sr. in a match in Mexico City that drew over 130,000 fans, many of those were the equivalent of “Tijuana taxi drivers.”

But Chavez showed surprising skill, and mettle, in handling Sebastian Zbik on June 4 to win the WBC belt that had been stripped from Martinez. Zbik isn’t a dangerous puncher, but he was a quality boxer with a lot of experience who was the favorite.

“That was a big turning point for me, that fight,” Chavez said. “He is a very good fighter and when I beat him, I knew I could compete with anyone.”

He handled Peter Manfredo easily in his first title defense and is looking much more like he belongs than just a protected kid treading off his father’s big name.

He saved a young Cassius Clay when he was in trouble in England, convinced Sugar Ray Leonard that he could somehow overcome the fearsome Tommy Hearns. Angelo Dundee worked thousands of corners, and had just as many stories about fighters and the games they played in the ring.

The best work of his life, though, may have been selling a sport that was often tough to sell.

“He spread good will for a sport that often doesn’t have a lot of good will,” said retired AP boxing writer Ed Schuyler Jr. “What he did to promote boxing is his greatest contribution to the sport.”

Dundee, who died Wednesday in Tampa, Fla., at the age of 90, was a master motivator who shared the world stage with the greatest fighters of his time. But it was his 53-year relationship with The Greatest and the way they shocked the world together that will always be his legacy.

Muhammad Ali didn’t need anyone to tell him how to box. He came by it so naturally that there wasn’t much Dundee was going to teach him in the ring to help him become a legendary fighter.

What he needed was someone in his corner shouting motivation, someone in his corner who always had his back.

Someone like Angelo Dundee.

“There was a time you couldn’t tell Ali anything, but Angelo knew how to motivate Ali,” promoter Bob Arum said. “Without Angelo, Ali doesn’t get out of the “Thrilla in Manila.” Without Angelo I think Joe Frazier destroys him. He needed someone like that in his corner.”

So did Leonard, who was taking a beating in his epic first fight with Hearns in 1981. His face was swollen by the thunderous right hands landed by Hearns and he seemed baffled when Hearns began boxing him from the outside instead of trying to slug it out as he had in the early rounds.

After the end of the 12th round, Leonard came back to his corner, exhausted.

“You’re blowing it, son!” Dundee yelled at him. “You’re blowing it!”

Leonard would rally in the 13th round before finally stopping Hearns in the 14th round of a fight he was trailing on all three ringside scorecards. It was a masterful performance by a great fighter, but without Dundee in his face many believe Leonard would have come up short.

“He really knew how to motivate a guy,” Arum said. “He was a good trainer, but he was a great, great cornerman. He was the greatest cornerman I’ve ever seen.”

It wasn’t all just motivation, though. Dundee wasn’t above resorting to a few tricks in the ring if that was what it took to help his guy win.

British fight fans still talk about the night at London’s Wembley Stadium in June 1963 when their great hope, Henry Cooper, floored Ali—who had yet to change his name from Clay—in the final seconds of the fourth round with a devastating left hook. Dundee managed to get his fighter to the corner when the bell rang, but Ali still didn’t know where he was. Thinking fast, Dundee pointed out a small split in Ali’s glove to the referee, sending British boxing officials in search of new gloves and gaining enough time for Ali to recover and stop Cooper in the next round.

Cooper would later become one of Dundee’s good friends. Of course, Dundee had many good friends.

“The guy didn’t have an enemy in the world,” said matchmaker Bruce Trampler, who went to work for Dundee in Miami in 1971. “He was everyone’s best friend.”

Dundee traveled the world with Ali, and in the racially charged `60s was often the only white face in an otherwise black entourage. Ali felt secure with him in his corner, though he didn’t often take his advice.

He may have changed the course of boxing history in Ali’s first fight against Sonny Liston in 1964 when he refused Ali’s demands after the fourth round to cut off his boxing gloves and let him quit because something on Liston’s gloves was causing his eyes to burn terribly. He calmed down a frantic Ali, who came back to stop Liston at the end of the sixth round and become heavyweight champion for the first time.

Dundee, though, couldn’t claim credit for Ali’s greatest strategic move in the ring, when he used the “rope-a-dope” to stop George Foreman in the “Rumble in the Jungle.” Though popular lore was that Dundee had the ring ropes loosened so Ali could lay against them and make Foreman tire himself out, Dundee had actually gotten the ropes tightened just before the fight began and was screaming at Ali to get off the ropes as Foreman unloaded punch after punch before finally running out of gas.

Dundee was still in relatively good health when he traveled with his son, Jimmy, to Louisville, Ky., last month for Ali’s 70th birthday party. The aging fighter and his elderly trainer talked and posed for pictures, and Dundee reminisced about the past.

“I’ve had a lot of great fighters and a lot of great times,” Dundee said then. “But the greatest time of my life was with Muhammad Ali.”

Jimmy Dundee said the visit meant everything to his father, who was hospitalized with a blood clot shortly after returning home. He was later released and seemed to be recovering before having trouble breathing. He died surrounded by his children and grandchildren, a peaceful end to a life well lived.

“He had a ball. He lived his life and he had a good time,” Jimmy Dundee said. “I’m so glad we went. It meant so much for him to see Muhammad again.”

Dundee will be forever linked to Ali, and his death—which followed by just a few months the passing of Frazier—erases another link to an era long gone. Though Dundee will be remembered as Ali’s trainer and cornerman, his son said he would also like him to be known as something else:

In the often brutal and cutthroat world of boxing, he stood out as an extraordinary ambassador for the sport. Anyone who met him was his friend, whether they were in his corner or across the ring.

To those who wondered why, Dundee always had the same reply:

“It doesn’t cost anything more to be nice.”

The story is familiar even to the most casual of boxing fans: The young fighter of Filipino descent starts off in the lightest weight classes, dominating opponents and picking up titles. One by one, he punches his way to world championships, leaving in his wake a collection of battered and beaten bodies.

He’s doubted at first, derided as “just a little guy,” but he eventually wins over the critics and becomes widely regarded as the best fighter in the world.

Manny Pacquiao was on that path about 10 years ago and is now, along with Floyd Mayweather Jr., by far one of the two best fighters in the sport.

Nonito "The Filipino Flash" Donaire owns world titles at flyweight, super flyweight and bantamweight.
(Getty Images)

Nonito Donaire (27-1, with 18 knockouts) is on that same path right now and it would hardly be a shocker if the three-division world champion wound up with belts in six or seven classes and was universally recognized as the greatest fighter in the world within a couple of years.

“He is already a great fighter and he has such great knockout power and overall fighting ability; he can still get a lot better,” said Freddie Roach, Pacquiao’s trainer. “I was talking with [ex-boxer] Jesse James Leija the other day and we were saying how hard this guy can punch. He’s really dangerous and he can knock you out with one shot.

“To me, even though maybe he doesn’t get the recognition like Manny does, or like [Mayweather], he’s already in the top five and I think he has the ability to move up.”

[Related: Floyd Mayweather Jr. will fight Miguel Cotto on May 5]

Donaire, who owns world titles at flyweight, super flyweight and bantamweight, will seek a fourth crown Saturday when he meets Wilfredo Vazquez Jr. at the Alamodome for the vacant World Boxing Organization super bantamweight belt in a bout televised by HBO.

Donaire is hardly caught up in the hype. He’s eager to fight, particularly coming off a bout in October in which Omar Narvaez sought to survive and didn’t engage, making for an ugly fight which drew hoots from the bloodthirsty crowd.

He’s looking forward to swapping blows with Vazquez in the kind of fight in which his speed and power almost always wins out, and insists he’s not thinking of what may lie ahead.

All the accolades are great, said Donaire, a good photographer who is frequently seen shooting fights at ringside, but they mean nothing until his career is complete.

“I don’t think about it,” he says of the similarities to Pacquiao’s career path. “I enjoy boxing for the moment. I love the excitement and the competition. I am content to leave it to the fans to decide my place in the sport’s history.”

Donaire, 29, is right about where Pacquiao was at the same age. Pacquiao turned 29 on Dec. 17, 2007, and was regarded as a top-10 fighter by that stage.

Pac-Mania was in full force in the Philippines by then, but it hadn’t really caught on as much in the U.S. He’d just come off a convincing win over a faded Marco Antonio Barrera and was poised to fight Juan Manuel Marquez for a third time in a bid for the super featherweight belt.

It was that split-decision win over Marquez on March 15, 2008, that started Pacquiao collecting belts like Christmas ornaments. After winning the super featherweight title from Marquez, he won the World Boxing Council lightweight title from David Diaz in his next outing. After a non-title bout with Oscar De La Hoya, Pacquiao then won super lightweight, welterweight and super welterweight titles in his next four matches.

Currently, Donaire is fifth in the Yahoo! Sports ratings, behind Mayweather, Pacquiao, Sergio Martinez and Marquez.

If he wins on Saturday – and he’s a heavy favorite to do so – it will be his fourth championship, and a jump to featherweight would be looming fairly quickly.

“He doesn’t have the body to go much beyond [super featherweight], I don’t think,” said his manager, Cameron Dunkin, one of the game’s most astute observers. “But if he can pull that off – and it’s a lot to ask of anyone – and goes through 122, 126 and 130, when you put that together with what he’s already done, it’s pretty amazing.”

Donaire’s biggest competition for the top spot, once Mayweather and Pacquiao leave the scene, is probably his close friend, super middleweight champion Andre Ward.

Ward, the 2004 light heavyweight gold medalist, is a brilliant tactician who is just now emerging as a complete fighter. Ward, ranked sixth in the Yahoo! poll, has the defensive ability, the power and the punching accuracy, and, most significantly, the quality opponents to make him ascend to the top spot.

Bruce Trampler, the Hall of Fame matchmaker from Top Rank, raves about Donaire, but said if there is something that may keep him from earning legendary status, it’s the quality of opposition he ahead.

“He’s already an exceptional talent,” Trampler said. “He has a chance to be a great, great fighter, but when you think of the all-time greats, Sugar Ray Leonard had [Marvelous Marvin] Hagler, Tommy Hearns, [Roberto] Duran, [Wilfredo] Benitez, guys who were great in their own rights.

“You think of Ray as great, and he was because of the great fighters he beat. That’s the one question about how this kid will be remembered, but he is without a doubt a tremendous talent.”

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There was no way Angelo Dundee was going to miss Muhammad Ali's 70th birthday party.

The genial trainer got to see his old friend, and reminisce about good times. It was almost as if they were together in their prime again, and what a time that was.

Dundee died in his apartment in Tampa, Fla., Wednesday night at the age of 90, and with him a part of boxing died, too.

He was surrounded by his family, said his son, Jimmy, who said the visit with Ali in Louisville, Ky., meant everything to his Dad.

"It was the way he wanted to go," the son said. "He did everything he wanted to do."

Jimmy Dundee said his father was hospitalized for a blood clot last week and was briefly in a rehabilitation facility before returning to his apartment.

"He was coming along good yesterday and then he started to have breathing problems. My wife was with him at the time, thank God, and called and said he can't breathe. We all got over there. All the grandkids were there. He didn't want to go slowly," the son said.

Dundee was the brilliant motivator who worked the corner for Ali in his greatest fights, willed Sugar Ray Leonard to victory in his biggest bout, and coached hundreds of young men in the art of a left jab and an overhand right.

More than that, he was a figure of integrity in a sport that often lacked it.

"To me, he was the greatest ambassador for boxing, the greatest goodwill ambassador in a sport where there's so much animosity and enemies," said Bruce Trampler, the longtime matchmaker who first went to work for Dundee in 1971. "The guy didn't have an enemy in the world."

How could he, when his favourite line was, "It doesn't cost anything more to be nice."

Dundee was best known for being in Ali's corner for almost his entire career, urging him on in his first fight against Sonny Liston through the legendary fights with Joe Frazier and beyond. He was a cornerman, but he was much more, serving as a motivator for fighters not so great and for The Greatest.

Promoter Bob Arum said he had been planning to bring Dundee to Las Vegas for a Feb. 18 charity gala headlined by Ali.

"He was wonderful. He was the whole package," Arum said. "Angelo was the greatest motivator of all time. No matter how bad things were, Angelo always put a positive spin on them. That's what Ali loved so much about him."

Arum credited Dundee with persuading Ali to continue in his third fight against Joe Frazier when Frazier was coming on strong in the "Thrilla in Manilla." Without Dundee, Arum said, Ali may not have had the strength to come back and stop Frazier after the 14th round in what became an iconic fight.

Dundee also worked the corner for Leonard, famously shouting, "You're blowing it, son. You're blowing it" when Leonard fell behind in his 1981 fight with Tommy Hearns — a fight he would rally to win by knockout.

A master motivator and clever corner man, Dundee was regarded as one of the sport's great ambassadors. He was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1992 after a career that spanned six decades, training 15 world champions, including Leonard, George Foreman, Carmen Basilio and Jose Napoles.

"He had a ball. He lived his life and had a great time," Jimmy Dundee said. "He was still working with an amateur kid, a possible Olympic kid, down here. When he walked into a boxing room he still had the brain for it."

Dundee will always be linked to Ali as one of the most successful fighter-trainer relationships in boxing history, helping Ali become the first to win the heavyweight title three times. The pair would travel around the world for fights to such obscure places as Ali's October 1974 bout in Zaire against Foreman dubbed "The Rumble in the Jungle," and Ali's third fight against Frazier in the Philippines.

"I just put the reflexes in the proper direction," Dundee said in a 2005 interview with The Associated Press.

He did much more than that, said Gene Kilroy, who was Ali's business manager for much of his career.

"There were people who tried to push him out, and Ali would never let it happen," Kilroy said. "Ali knew he kept everyone in harmony, kept everything in check. More than that, he found good in everybody. We used to joke that he could find something good in Charles Manson. He was just that way with everyone."

The partnership with Ali began in Louisville, Ali's hometown, in 1959. Dundee was there with light heavyweight Willie Pastrano when the young Ali, then known as Cassius Clay, called their room from a hotel phone to ask if he could have five minutes. Clay, a local Golden Gloves champion, kept asking the men boxing questions in a conversation that lasted 3 1/2 hours, according to Dundee's autobiography, "My View From the Corner: A Life in Boxing."

After Ali returned from Rome with a gold medal at the 1960 Olympics, Dundee ran into him in Louisville and invited him to come to Miami Beach to train. Ali declined. But that December, Dundee got a call from one of Ali's handlers, seeking to hire Dundee. After Ali won his first pro fight, Dundee accepted.

He helped Ali claim the heavyweight title for the first time on Feb. 25, 1964, when Sonny Liston quit on his stool after the sixth round during their fight in Miami Beach.

In an age of boxing when fighter-manager relationships rarely last, Dundee and Ali would never split.

When Cassius Clay angered white America by joining the Black Muslims and become Muhammad Ali, Dundee never wavered. When Ali defied the draft at the height of the Vietnam war, losing 3 1/2 years from the prime of his career, Dundee was there waiting for the heavyweight's return. And when Ali would make bold projections, spewing poetry that made headlines across the world and gave him the nickname "The Louisville Lip," Dundee never asked him to keep quiet.

"Through all those days of controversy, and the many that followed, Angelo never got involved," Ali wrote in the foreword to Dundee's book. "He let me be exactly who I wanted to be, and he was loyal. That is the reason I love Angelo."

Born Angelo Mirena on Aug. 30, 1921, in south Philadelphia, Dundee's boxing career was propelled largely by his older brother, Chris, a promoter. After returning from World War II — "We won, but not because of anything I did" — he joined Chris in the boxing game in New York, serving as his "go-fer" and getting the tag "Chris' kid brother." Angelo and Chris followed another brother Joe, who was a fighter, in changing their surname to Dundee so their parents wouldn't know they worked in boxing.

He learned to tape hands and handle cuts as a corner man in the late 1940s, building his knowledge by watching and learning as a "bucket boy" in New York for trainers like Chickie Ferrara, Charlie Goldman and Ray Arcel, among others. Word of Dundee's expertise spread, and seasoned fighters lined up to have him in their corner.

He worked major boxing scenes with Chris, with stops at the famed Stillman's Gym in New York and Miami Beach's 5th Street Gym. Dundee's fun-loving attitude, combined with his powerful Philly accent, made him a joy to be around. His lifelong love and respect for the sport earned him praise from those across the boxing world.

"He is the only man in boxing to whom I would entrust my own son," the late sportscaster Howard Cosell once said of Dundee.

In the late 1970s, with Ali nearing retirement, Dundee quickly jumped into the corner for an emerging star named Sugar Ray Leonard, whom Dundee called "a smaller Ali." Dundee trained Leonard for many of his biggest fights — including bouts against Wilfred Benitez, Roberto Duran and Thomas Hearns — and helped him become one of the most recognized welterweight champions in history.

Dundee later teamed with Foreman in 1994 to help him become the oldest heavyweight champion at age 45 when he beat Michael Moorer. In one last attempt to help a big fighter win a big fight, Dundee helped train Oscar De La Hoya for his Dec. 6, 2008, fight with pound-for-pound king Manny Pacquiao. Dundee did not work the corner on fight night; perhaps the 35-year-old "Golden Boy" could have used him. De La Hoya declined to answer the bell for the ninth round.

Always a slick strategist and fierce competitor, Dundee developed countless tricks to help his fighters win.

If he thought a referee might stop a fight because of a gash on his fighter, Dundee would stretch his butt so the referee couldn't peek into the corner, allowing him to conceal the wound before the bell. If a fighter was tired, Dundee would do anything he could to buy time, once untying a boxer's shoes after every round only to slowly retie the laces each time.

Dundee also went well beyond the usual tricks of smelling salts to revive fighters.

If his man was dazed, Dundee would often drop ice down the fighter's shorts to take their attention off injuries. During Ali's 1963 fight against Henry Cooper, Dundee pulled off a stunt that took him decades to publicly acknowledge.

After Cooper dropped Ali and left him dizzy at the end of the fourth round, Dundee alerted the referee to a small rip on Ali's gloves — a split Dundee would later admit he noticed before the fight — and the search for replacement gloves that never came gave Ali a few extra seconds to recover. Ali pounded Cooper's cuts in the fifth and the fight was stopped, keeping Ali's title shot alive. Many boxing commissions would soon require extra gloves to be kept at every fight.

Dundee never held back the one-liners in the corner, either, saying anything he could to get his fighters charged.

Dundee also loved to tell the story of the night he was in the corner for a little-known heavyweight named Johnny Holman. Remembering that Holman's dream was to buy a house, Dundee tried to motivate Holman when he said, "This guy's taking away your house from you. He's taking away those shutters from you. He's taking away that television set from you." Holman would come back to win — and get that house.

After living in the Miami area for decades, Dundee moved to the Tampa suburb of Oldsmar in 2007 to be closer to his two children after his wife of more than 50 years, Helen, fell ill. She died three years later.

___

AP Sports Writer Antonio Gonzalez contributed to this report.

Angelo Dundee, the brilliant motivator who worked the corner for Muhammad Ali in his greatest fights and willed Sugar Ray Leonard to victory in his biggest bout, died Wednesday in Tampa, Fla. He was 90.

The genial Dundee was best known for being in Ali’s corner for almost his entire career, but those in boxing also knew him as an ambassador for boxing and a figure of integrity in a sport that often lacked it.

He died with his family surrounding him, said son, Jimmy Dundee, but not before being able to attend Ali’s 70th birthday bash in Louisville, Ky., last month.

“It was the way he wanted to go,” Jimmy Dundee said. “He did everything he wanted to do.”

Jimmy Dundee said his father was hospitalized for a blood clot last week and was briefly in a rehabilitation facility before returning to his apartment.

Angelo Dundee was in Muhammad Ali's corner for nearly all of his career.
(Getty Images)

“He was coming along good yesterday and then he started to have breathing problems. My wife was with him at the time, thank God, and called and said he can’t breathe. We all got over there. All the grandkids were there. He didn’t want to go slowly,” the son said.

Promoter Bob Arum said he had been planning to bring Dundee to Las Vegas for a Feb. 18 charity gala headlined by Ali. He called Dundee a legend in the sport, someone who worked the corner for some of the greatest fights of the times.

“He was wonderful, he was the whole package,” Arum said. “Angelo was the greatest motivator of all time. No matter how bad things were, Angelo always put a positive spin on them. That’s what Ali loved so much about him.”

Arum credited Dundee with persuading Ali to continue in his third fight against Joe Frazier when Frazier was coming on strong in the “Thrilla in Manilla.” Without Dundee, Arum said, Ali may not have had the strength to come back and stop Frazier after the 14th round in what became an iconic fight.

Dundee also worked the corner for Leonard, famously shouting “You’re blowing it son. You’re blowing it” when Leonard fell behind in his 1981 fight with Tommy Hearns—a fight he would rally to win by knockout.

A master motivator and clever corner man, Dundee was regarded as one of the sport’s great ambassadors. He was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1992 after a career that spanned six decades, training 15 world champions, including Leonard, George Foreman, Carmen Basilio and Jose Napoles.

But he will always be linked to Ali as one of the most successful fighter-trainer relationships in boxing history, helping Ali become the first to win the heavyweight title three times. The pair would travel around the world for fights to such obscure places as Ali’s October 1974 bout in Zaire against Foreman dubbed “The Rumble in the Jungle,” and Ali’s third fight against Frazier in the Philippines.

“I just put the reflexes in the proper direction,” Dundee said in a 2005 interview with The Associated Press.

Their partnership began in Louisville, Ali’s hometown, in 1959. Dundee was there with light heavyweight Willie Pastrano when the young Ali, then known as Cassius Clay, called their room from a hotel phone to ask if he could have five minutes. Clay, a local Golden Gloves champion, kept asking the men boxing questions in a conversation that lasted 3 1/2 hours, according to Dundee’s autobiography, “My View From the Corner: A Life in Boxing.”

After Ali returned from Rome with a gold medal at the 1960 Olympics, Dundee ran into him in Louisville and invited him to come to Miami Beach to train. Ali declined. But that December, Dundee got a call from one of Ali’s handlers, seeking to hire Dundee. After Ali won his first pro fight, Dundee accepted.

He helped Ali claim the heavyweight title for the first time on Feb. 25, 1964, when Sonny Liston quit on his stool after the sixth round during their fight in Miami Beach.

In an age of boxing when fighter-manager relationships rarely last, Dundee and Ali would never split.

When Cassius Clay angered white America by joining the Black Muslims and become Muhammad Ali, Dundee never wavered. When Ali defied the draft at the height of the Vietnam war, losing 3 1/2 years from the prime of his career, Dundee was there waiting for the heavyweight’s return. And when Ali would make bold projections, spewing poetry that made headlines across the world and gave him the nickname “The Louisville Lip,” Dundee never asked him to keep quiet.

“Through all those days of controversy, and the many that followed, Angelo never got involved,” Ali wrote in the foreword to Dundee’s book. “He let me be exactly who I wanted to be, and he was loyal. That is the reason I love Angelo.”

Born Angelo Mirena on Aug. 30, 1921, in south Philadelphia, Dundee’s boxing career was propelled largely by his older brother, Chris, a promoter. After returning from World War II—“We won, but not because of anything I did”—he joined Chris in the boxing game in New York, serving as his “go-fer” and getting the tag “Chris’ kid brother.” Angelo and Chris followed another brother Joe, who was a fighter, in changing their surname to Dundee so their parents wouldn’t know they worked in boxing.

He learned to tape hands and handle cuts as a corner man in the late 1940s, building his knowledge by watching and learning as a “bucket boy” in New York for trainers like Chickie Ferrara, Charlie Goldman and Ray Arcel among others. Word of Dundee’s expertise spread, and seasoned fighters lined up to have him in their corner.

He worked major boxing scenes with Chris, with stops at the famed Stillman’s Gym in New York and Miami Beach’s 5th Street Gym. Dundee’s fun-loving attitude combined with his powerful Philly accent made him a joy to be around. His lifelong love and respect for the sport earned him praise from those across the boxing world.

“He is the only man in boxing to whom I would entrust my own son,” the late sportscaster Howard Cosell once said of Dundee.

In the late 1970s, with Ali nearing retirement, Dundee quickly jumped into the corner for an emerging star named Sugar Ray Leonard, who Dundee called “a smaller Ali.” Dundee trained Leonard for many of his biggest fights—including bouts against Wilfred Benitez, Roberto Duran and Thomas Hearns—and helped him become one of the most recognized welterweight champions in history.

Dundee later teamed up with Foreman in 1994 to help him become the oldest heavyweight champion at age 45 when he beat Michael Moorer. In one last attempt to help a big fighter win a big fight, Dundee helped train Oscar De La Hoya for his Dec. 6, 2008, fight with pound-for-pound king Manny Pacquiao. Dundee did not work the corner on fight night, and perhaps the 35-year-old “Golden Boy” could have used Dundee. De La Hoya declined to answer the bell for the ninth round.

Always a slick strategist and fierce competitor, Dundee developed countless tricks to help his fighters win.

If he thought a referee might stop a fight because of a gash on his fighter, Dundee would stand between boxer and referee, preventing the official getting a peek into the corner, and allowing him to conceal the wound before the bell. If a fighter was tired, Dundee would do anything he could to buy time, once untying a boxer’s shoes after every round only to slowly retie the laces each time.

Dundee also went well beyond the usual tricks of smelling salts to revive fighters.

If his man was dazed, Dundee would often drop ice down the fighter’s shorts to take their attention off injuries. During Ali’s 1963 fight against Henry Cooper, Dundee pulled off a stunt that took him decades to publicly acknowledge.

After Cooper dropped Ali and left him dizzy at the end of the fourth round, Dundee alerted the referee to a small rip on Ali’s gloves—a split Dundee would later admit he noticed before the fight—and the search for replacement gloves that never came gave Ali a few extra seconds to recover. Ali pounded Cooper’s cuts in the fifth and the fight was stopped, keeping Ali’s title shot alive. Many boxing commissions would soon require extra gloves to be kept at every fight.

Dundee never held back the one-liners in the corner, either, saying anything he could to get his fighters charged.

Dundee also loved to tell the story of the night he was in the corner for a little-known heavyweight named Johnny Holman. Remembering that Holman’s dream was to buy a house, Dundee tried to motivate Holman when he said, “This guy’s taking away your house from you. He’s taking away those shutters from you. He’s taking away that television set from you.” Holman would come back to win—and get that house.

After living in the Miami area for decades, Angelo Dundee moved to the Tampa suburb of Oldsmar in 2007 to be closer to his two children after his wife of more than 50 years, Helen, died.

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AP Sports Writer Antonio Gonzalez contributed to this report.