05/29/2021 6:00 AM
Clarín.com
sports
Updated 05/29/2021 6:00 AM
The guy with the dreadlocks.
This is how many boxing fans identify
David Diamante
. Not because of his name (which some don't even know) or because of his powerful baritone voice, but because of that
meter and a half
of
dreadlocks
that hang from his scalp and that became the main distinguishing mark of a man who earned a place. among
announcers evenings elite
, an area that seemed to
have two sole owners:
Michael Buffer
and
Jimmy Lennon Jr
.
The visionary was her grandmother.
"
You have a wonderful voice and you have to use it to live," he
used to say to little David, although without clarifying how.
By those days, boxing was already part of his life, although not necessarily in the most pleasant way.
“Boxing was always important to the men in my family.
My father was my first coach, but also my first rival.
I suffered a lot of physical abuse in my house
and in the streets there were many fights.
Fighting was an integral part of my life, "he said in an interview last year.
Initially, those streets were those of Baltimore, where her parents, both from Brooklyn (she, a teacher, he, a lawyer) had settled.
Diamante was born on November 8, 1971, and raised in an area he still calls
“the DMV,”
a patch of territory that encompasses the District of Columbia, western Maryland, and northeastern Virginia.
David Diamante, in the presentation of the press conference prior to the fight between Saúl Canelo Álvarez and Callum Smith.
There he made contact with the nascent hardcore scene in which bands such as
Minor Threat, Bad Brains, Scream and Void
were enlisted
.
But David ignored his grandmother's advice about his voice and did not try his luck singing, but playing drums since he was 10 years old.
Music was the axis of his life in those years, although he never neglected sports (he practiced basketball, baseball and American football).
While still a teenager, he
left the family home
and traveled to different parts of the United States.
He lived in houses taken and also on the streets
before settling in San Francisco.
He was a bartender, porter, pizza maker, and messenger until he began making a living as a nightclub DJ.
By then, and after a couple of unsuccessful attempts, he had managed to
stop using alcohol and drugs
.
Since December 4, 1992, he has remained "clean and sober,"
as he revealed last year on his Twitter account.
"Cleaning myself was the most difficult thing I have done in my life, but the most rewarding," he said.
28 yrs clean & sober today 🙏
Filled with gratitude ❤️
Getting clean was the hardest thing I've ever done, but the most rewarding
There are no shortcuts
You have to put in the work
If you're struggling with substance abuse, please know there is a better way 💪🏽 pic.twitter.com/yjPLVogre6
- David Diamante (@daviddiamante) December 4, 2020
In California, he began boxing at King's Boxing Gym in Oakland, although he
soon learned that he would never be a professional
.
In any case, he was passionate about sport and he wanted to remain linked to it.
The resolution of this crossroads still took him a few years, during which he
toured much of the world
after an initiatory journey that took him to Europe, the Middle East, India, China and Southeast Asia.
In the early 2000s, Diamante settled in Brooklyn.
There the previous four generations of his family had been born.
This is why he considers himself a
brooklynite
.
“At the time, I was making good money and was having fun at nightclubs.
But one day
I asked myself what my dream job was
and I realized that
being a ring announcer was the best.
So I went to a gym and volunteered, ”he recalled.
The owner of the place asked him to leave his name and phone number.
David Diamante settled two decades ago in Brooklyn, the district where the previous four generations of his family were born.
It took several months for the phone to finally ring. They offered to feature the boxers on an amateur undercard at Church Street Gym, a basement gym in New York. He tried, convinced and continued. For years he advertised amateur matches
without charging a dollar in return.
"I never thought it would become something big, I just loved being a part of the sport," he acknowledged.
In those years of crowded basements, clouds of cigarette smoke, modest facilities and limited budgets, he had to
introduce boxers who would later become world champions such
as Daniel Jacobs, Paul Malignaggi or Saddam Ali.
Little by little, he made a place
on the professional charts
in Atlantic City and then in Madison Square Garden.
David Diamante presents the fight between Juan Francisco Estrada and Dewayne Beamon.
The charismatic announcer combined English and Spanish on this evening at the Centro de Usos Multiples in Hermosillo (Mexico).
Now a well-known face, he worked for the main television networks on the planet and
even made advertisements in Spanish
(he learned the language mainly on his trips to Colombia and the Dominican Republic) in shows broadcast on
Televisa, Azteca TV and TyC Sports
.
He is currently the official announcer for the promoter
Matchroom Boxing
, headed by the English businessman Eddie Hearn, one of the most powerful on the planet.
While boxing is his strong suit and the sport that he is passionate about, Diamante also performed at mixed martial arts and muay thai evenings.
And for six years he
was the voice in the stadium
of an NBA team, the Nets, in a process that also marked a sporting revival for his beloved Brooklyn.
For six years, David Diamante was the voice of the stadium in the Nets' NBA games.
The tall man with the dreadlocks (1.91 meters tall) was chosen at the end of 2011 in a casting of which more than 400 applicants for the position participated.
He made his debut in the preseason game that the Nets lost 92-83 to the New York Knicks on December 17 of that year.
He accompanied the team in that season, the last in which he performed as a local in New Jersey, and in the following five, already settled in Brooklyn.
That move marked the return of a professional sports franchise to the district
after more than half a century
, since the Dodgers of Major League Baseball moved to Los Angeles in 1958.
But not only did he take advantage of his voice and his image.
Between 2012 and 2013, he was the television host of the sports newscast The Lights, which aired on NBC Sports.
And he also acted in four films
: Night of Henna (2005), Southpaw (2015), Back in the day (2016) and Senior moment (2021).
As if that weren't enough, he turned another of his passions into a business: cigars (he's also a fan of motorcycles).
For a decade he owned Diamante's Brooklyn Cigar Lounge, a cigar lounge, and has
his own brand of
handcrafted
cigars
.
David Diamante owned a cigar lounge for a decade.
Beyond these derivations, shouting about a ring was what allowed to build the small emporium of this
self made man
who has
not cut his hair since 1988
, starting from an extreme situation that he
never wanted to reveal
(“it involved a street fight and almost I give my life there ”, he managed to tell in an interview last year) and that he promised to clarify in his autobiography, that he is writing these days.
Less than six months after his 50th birthday, Diamante appears as the renewing figure in a world whose main faces in recent decades have been the fireproof
Michael Buffer
(he is 76 years old) and
Jimmy Lennon Jr.
(62), two men to whom that he
admires and considers friends
, although he avoids copying.
“Those guys are wonderful and they do a great job.
I always imitated his professionalism, but not his style ”, he assured.
David Diamante with his legendary colleague Michael Buffer.
The
Diamond style
includes some personal hallmarks such as the phrase
“The fight starts now”
and, above all, the way of introducing the boxers: shout out the full name, pause briefly and then repeat, in a more timid tone, the last name.
Why does he do this?
"Out of respect for the tradition of the sport and as
a nod to the great announcers of the past
."
“Before, some loudspeaker systems weren't that good and the announcers would call out the name once and then again into another part of the stadium so that the audience could hear it.
My two favorite presenters were
Mark Bureau and Ed Derian.
They always repeated the surnames and I loved that when I was a kid, ”he recalled.
But not only on the basis of pre-made recipes he built his brand.
Diamante
is an obsessive
who spends hours learning about the backgrounds and qualities of the boxers he must introduce to write his scripts, which must be "clear, concise and correct."
In addition, he draws on his experience as a musician and as a DJ.
David Diamante is the official host of promoter Matchroom Boxing.
“I announce almost as if singing
.
There is a musicality and a cadence to it.
It is not enough to have a good voice.
It has to sound pleasant to the ear.
Also, what makes me different is my understanding of live events.
I'm used to interacting with the crowd, I understand their emotion,
I know how to catch it and what it means to lose their attention
when you do something wrong ”, he explained.
If at this point someone is seduced by the Diamond style, they can turn to their micro-entrepreneurship to satisfy themselves: for 99 dollars they can manage, through their website,
a personalized recording
with a presentation for a world championship fight in the announcer's voice.
For $ 299, you can also get a video of that presentation.
And even those on a looser budget can
hire
the guy with the dreadlocks
for their party
.
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Michael Bentt, the Agassi of boxing who hated the sport, was a world champion and today lives off the glamor of Hollywood
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