While editing Split Decision with a Cuban editor who made it to America via the Cayman Islands at the age of 21, we noticed an extraordinary thing that separated Cuban boxers from American boxers.
When Cubans were victorious in the ring, their immediate instinct was to search and reach out to extend gratitude for anyone they could find who assisted or they felt was responsible for their accomplishment. Felix Savon's last fight when he won his third Olympic gold featured him, as the final bell rang, exhaustedly smiling out to Cubans in the audience yelling though he was out of breath, "Gracias Cuba!"
American fighters, on the hand, over and over basked in their own accomplishment. The gestures of victory all said: look at me. Arms outstretched. Chin high. Posing for history. Occasionally they'd bask in their accomplishment while simultaneously pointing out their humility as a means of compounding their achievement and virtue. It was humbling to make this much money or to have achieved this or that touchstone in their career.
The funny thing about this litmus test dividing Cuban and American boxers was that when we watched all the fights of the top Cuban boxers who defected, they began to adopt the same nature of celebration after their victories as Americans. Rigondeaux and Gamboa, for example, go further than reveling in their victories. They demonstrate contempt. Occasionally they go further than contempt and reveal the bitterness at the heart of their victories: while they want what America can offer them financially, they have both stated publicly on many occasions they'd much rather be fighting before a Cuban audience. Even more curious given how high profile their defections, they claim they remain fighting for Cuba.
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