“Gorgeous”
Gorges to make Debut After six years as an amateur boxer, Andre Gorges has had enough. Sort of. On Friday, the boxer whose mispronounced last name became a moniker makes his professional debut in Detroit.
“Gorgeous” Gorges (pronounced Georges) was an amateur workhorse, fighting roughly twenty-five times a year since he began six years ago. That is a large number of fights compared to boxers on this side of the river and is a testament to the drive of Gorges and his coach. As
an amateur, Gorges, 23, trained out of the Border City Boxing Club
in Windsor, Ontario, Canada. As a professional, he still will. And,
his coach, Josh Canty, will remain his coach while picking up the
additional task of manager. Gorges obtained his license in March
and has signed a five-year promotional contract with CLIP. “I was a street fighter,” Gorges said in a telephone interview Tuesday. “I was a real angry kid.”
But instead of using his newly learned fighting skills on the street, as one might expect, Gorges said that never happened. The boy that usually was the first to throw a punch found that he no longer was angry enough to do so. He got his aggression out in the ring. “Boxing actually calmed me down,” he said. But after 150 amateur fights with a roughly 130W-20L record, boxing got boring. Gorges wanted to turn pro two years ago but his coach convinced him to wait, to gain more experience. After six years, Gorges said he had fought everyone in his weight class and he was becoming disinterested. Earlier this year, he and Coach Canty made the decision to turn pro. Friday is the start of what he hopes will be a promising pro career. The
fight is at historic Fort Wayne in Detroit on Friday, at 8:00 pm.
Gorges’ opponent has yet to be announced and promoters did
not provide card information for the evening. |
