| |
|
|
Chris Byrd Responds To John
Ruiz's Comments; His Faith Keeps Him On The Right Track
By William Trillo
By now we have all seen that WBA Heavyweight Champ John Ruiz
and his comical sidekick "Stoney",( isn't he still
suspended?), have called out IBF Heavy Champ Chris Byrd.
It's been posted on almost every website including our own!
What you won't see on another site is Chris Byrd's initial
reaction to Johnny and Stoney's comments.
You will however be able to read those comments here and
only here, because we went straight to The Champ to see what
he had to say about all this, along the way we spoke to
Chris about his Christian faith and what it means to him as
a fighter and a man.
Well, I guess by now you know that John Ruiz, and his
foul mouthed manager/head trainer, Norman Stone are all over
the internet today, calling you out. Do you have any
response to the comments?
We fought amateur together, we were room mates on two trips,
I know him real well! Let me tell you this, I duck nobody!
He can call me out all he wants, if it's right for the fight
and they are ready to do it, give me a contract and I will
sign it. I don't even look at guys and then say Yay or Nay!
It's always Yay, let's do it! I have never had a game plan,
throughout my career I have never had a choice of who I got
to fight! Everything has always just fallen into place! I
pray about it and whatever the Lord has in store for me,
James Toney, John Ruiz, I really want to fight Klitschko,
they are possibilities that can be done with Don King for my
next fight! But whatever happens, really! I don't care who
it is, where we fight or what it's for, I just want to stay
active and keep fighting!
You mentioned praying about it, in your last fight before
the decision was read, you and your foe, Jameel McCline got
together and prayed. You certainly take your faith very
seriously, can you tell us about that?
This is my ministry more than anything! And I firmly believe
that now more than ever, and it starts back to the amateurs,
I wasn't a Christian back then, but a year after The
Olympics someone led me to The Lord and I got saved. I was a
skinny 165 pound middleweight, but I got this notion that I
wanted to be a heavyweight, and I would pray to the Lord
that if He let me get to the Heavyweights, I would represent
Him. I was a new Christian, so I don't know if I firmly
believed that The Lord would do something like that, it was
too hard for me to put on weight, put the next thing you
know, I am 195 pounds, I said , "Whoa, this must be real!" I
wanted to be a heavyweight, but I never thought I would ever
get there! Over the years everything started to come
together and I learned to trust Jesus for everything! And He
opened up and revealed to me that this is my mission. And
that is more important than the boxing! The boxing is
something you do, it's something you are blessed with, but
letting people see Jesus is something that tops everything
else! And I firmly understood that this is the reason why I
am here!
How do you keep firmly grounded in this business of
boxing, that has a reputation for being everything but pure
and innocent?
#1, I take my Wife everywhere with me, #2, I don't sweat
none of the stuff, sure there are certain times in my career
where I got down, and my Wife would ask me, " Have you took
it to The Lord?" And I can honestly say, I didn't! I wanted
to do it on my own, and things didn't work out, so I started
praying about it, if I truly trusted Him, I would pray about
it, and He will see the right way through, not my way, but
His way, His will be done. And I can tell you, there are so
many cases in boxing, I was The Christian , so I was not
getting the play, I was getting the negative stuff! But
taking it The Lord and not worrying about it, and staying
true to what I believe, He would always see me through, and
most importantly, it glorified Him, and that's what it's
supposed to do! It ain't about me, everybody in this
business knows I'm a Christian, everybody knows how I live
and everybody knows I got my wife with me all the time, I'm
a family guy! Usually in this sport those are thing that are
a no-no. But the Lord sees right through those people who
point fingers, He says, " You just keep representing Me, and
I will show you greater things!" And I firmly believe that
because He has got me to a point right now where I am the
best Heavyweight in the World! And that's crazy because I
only weigh 210 pounds and I am in the land of giants, and
they are getting bigger! It's funny, after a fight like the
one with Jameel, I end up weighing 200 pounds when it was
over, I lost 14 pounds during the fight! I am not supposed
to be here, it doesn't make any sense. It's not from me,
when people look at me, they have to see Jesus, I get emails
telling me to leave that religious stuff at home, you and
your Jesus and all that! And I think to myself, "Whatever,
you've seen Him, because you wouldn't have brought Him up if
you didn't see Him, my point is getting across to you, it's
making you think!"
So how are you enjoying your holidays? Doing anything
special?
I promised my Wife I would come back to Michigan every year,
it's been a tradition for her and her Grandmother, but her
Grandmother passed away a week before I fought, so this will
be the last year we come back here. I am going to start my
own tradition with my kids, and it's all about, " He is the
reason for the season!" My kids know about Jesus Christ, and
if wasn't for the birth, there wouldn't be the death, and if
it wasn't for the death, there wouldn't be no resurrection.
As Christians, we are glad He was born and died for us. We
realize that, and we try to realize it everyday! My message
to the World is not the baby in the manger, it's that grown
man who died on the cross for your sins!
|
|
|
