Lloyd Honeyghan

Lloyd Honeyghan (right) with fellow boxer Errol Christie

Lloyd Honeyghan (born 22 April 1960) is a retired British boxer and former undisputed welterweight champion of the world. Born in Jamaica, he was WBC, WBA & IBF welterweight champion from 1986 to 1987 and WBC welterweight champion from 1988 to 1989.

An agile boxer-fighter with good handspeed and punching power, Honeyghan turned professional in 1980, debuting with a 6 round points victory over fellow novice Mike Sullivan. He won his first 13 fights, including a victory over the tough Kostas Petrou, before positioning himself for an eliminator against the capable Lloyd Hibbert for the British Welterweight Title on 18th January 1983. Honeyghan outpointed the future British Junior Middleweight Champion over 10 rounds. He followed this by capturing the Southern Area Welterweight Title with a 4th round KO over the dangerous Sid Smith in March 1983.

Honeyghan captured the British Title by 12 round decision against the tough Cliff Gilpin on 5th April 1983, after suffering the first knockdown of his career in the 2nd round.

He remained busy throughout 1983, travelling to the United States to defeat Kevin Austin, then outpointing American contender Harold Brazier in London before rounding of the year with a clear points victory in a British Title rematch with Cliff Gilpin.

In 1984 Honeyghan fought only once, defeating Roberto Mendez, before on 5th January 1985, capturing the European Welterweight Title with a highly impressive 3rd round knockout of future two time World Junior Middleweight Champion Gianfranco Rosi in Perugia, Italy.

The next month he fought fellow unbeaten Englishman R W Smith, being given an extremely tough fight before Smith was forced to pull out with an injured hand at the close of the 6th round. Honeyghan kept extremely busy during 1985, defeating three American contenders in world title challenger Roger Stafford, followed by Danny Paul and Ralph Twinning before closing out the year with a stoppage victory over fellow world rated Briton Sylvester Mittee for the European, British and Commonwealth titles.

On 20th May 1986 Honeyghan stopped top American contender Horace Shufford in 8 rounds in London, earning him a tilt against the unbeaten and undisputed World Welterweight Champion Donald Curry of the United States.

At the time Curry was considered one of the best pound for pound fighters in the world and Honeyghan was given little chance by the majority of the media. He caused a major upset by dominating the fight, nearly dropping Curry in the second round, before Curry retired at the end of round six. Before the fight Curry had himself dismissed his unknown foreign opponent, asking "Who is this ragamuffin?". Honeyghan thereafter adopted the title "ragamuffin" or "Ragamuffin Man" with relish.

The fight had taken place one night after another "expert shocker", when Edwin Rosario knocked out Livingstone Bramble in two rounds to claim the WBA lightweight title, and one week after Honeyghan's win, Ring Magazine mentioned his victory on their "Weekend of shockers!" issue's cover. (Rosario's photo was featured on the cover of that issue).

He then changed his boxer-puncher style to that of more of an out-and-out slugger. In his first defence, after dominating and flooring his opponent in the first round, he caused controversy by racing across the ring and hitting his opponent, former World Jr.Welter Champ Johnny Bumphus as soon as the bell sounded at the start of the second round. Bumphus was given time to recover but the fight had been knocked out of him already and he did not last much longer. In his second defence of the title, Honeyghan defeated the then unbeaten future World Champion Maurice Blocker on points. He become a crowd pleaser with his all action style of fighting and recorded one of the fastest wins in a world title fight with a 40 second blow-out of former light welterweight champion Gene Hatcher of the United States.

He lost his title to Jorge Vaca in 1987 when a clash of heads meant that the fight had to be stopped due to a cut sustained by Vaca. The scorecards at the time of the stoppage favoured Vaca.

Honeyghan became only the second British boxer in history to regain a world title when he easily knocked Vaca out in a return fight in the 3rd round, the first being Ted "Kid" Lewis earlier in the 20th century.

Honeyghan disagreed with the WBA's rules that allowed fights to take place in apartheid South Africa, so he publicly dumped the WBA welterweight belt into a London trash bin soon after winning it, relinquishing the title rather than defending it against South African Harold Volbrecht. This move would prove significant, as soon after, the WBA stopped sanctioning fights held in South Africa.

Honeyghan next defended against tough South Korean Yung-Kil Chung, halting him in 5 rounds in July 1988.

However on 4th February 1989 Honeyghan was to lose his titles to former Don Curry victim Marlon Starling, Honeyghan boxed wildly against the defensively excellent Starling, and was TKO'd in 9 rounds.

Honeyghan returned later in the year, labouring to a points decision over Delfino Marin in the USA, however he appeared to be a fading force.

He had to apologise to the WBA for his previous actions in order to fight for the WBA title in 1990 against Mark Breland. By this time Honeyghan was past his best, having lost the WBC title to Marlon Starling in 1989, and was stopped by Breland in 3 rounds after being knocked down 6 times. Honeyghan claimed to be weight-weakened, but was probably both sliding skillwise and suffering from the effects of the punishment he had taken in the Starling fight.

In 1991, he resumed his career at light middleweight and during 1991 and 1992 he won 6 consecutive fights against relatively respectable opposition in Mario Olmedo, John Welters, Darryl Anthony, Alfredo Ramirez, Mickey Duncan and Carlo Colarusso. In early 1993 he was still good enough to win the Commonwealth title at Light Middleweight by defeating the useful Mickey Hughes, however in June of that year he was stopped in ten rounds by world champion Vinny Pazienza. Victories over Steve Goodwin and in 1994 Kevin Adamson followed, with Honeyghan once more capturing the Commonwealth Title in the latter fight. He did not fight for another year, and retired after he was stopped in a Middleweight bout by fellow Briton Adrian Dodson in three rounds 1995.

Following his retirement he tried his hand at boxing promoting but without the contacts did not make much of an impact.

Lloyd once stated before a title fight against Maurice Blocker, that if he couldn't get a bout with Sugar Ray Leonard, he would retire, although his manager and promoter, Mickey Duff, said this was nonsense.

He is a speaker on the after dinner circuit and sometimes can be found ringside at some of the major shows in London.

See also

• List of British welterweight boxing champions

External links

• Professional boxing record for Lloyd Honeyghan from BoxRec
• Lloyd Honeyghan's Official website
• Monique Honeyghan's Clothing line Official website
• Lloyd Honeyghan Jnr's Clothing Line Official website