Michael Gomez was a ferocious warrior who came through in the late 1990s Manchester boxing boom with Ricky Hatton and Anthony Farnell.
The pinnacle for Gomez came in 2003 when he dropped and stopped then 16-0 Scot Alex Arthur in a Fight of the Year in Edinburgh.
Gomez was a rip-roaring, battling bodypuncher and in many exciting fights in his 38-10 (25 KOs). career.
Even when, outsized and past his best, Gomez boxed Amir Khan in a 2008 bout in Birmingham, he still gave Khan some rocky moments and had him on the deck.
Khan was 17-0 at the time.
Gomez’s son is Michael Gomez Jnr and he is 21-2 (6 KOs) as a pro.
He turned over with the famous name looming large over him, and believes it presented him with a burden of expectation at the start of his career.
“I think it was,” Gomez told BoxingScene. “Whereas now I don’t really give a fuck, to be honest with you. It is what it is. I’m my own person. I’m my own fighter. I do what I please when I please and I take the rub of the green. Whether it’s bad, it’s good, I’m not fussed.”
But his dad wasn’t just a quality fighter. He was known for bringing excitement. Gomez Snr made for compelling viewing and he saw it as his job not just to fight, but to go to war. That is something Gomez Jnr tries to identify with.
“I think that’s one thing I can say, even my last fight and my worst performance of my career [a loss to Reece Bellotti], down to probably my own fault – I think making the weight one too many times – but even then, till the end, it was blood, guts and glory. Every fight I have. I don’t think people have ever left and said, ‘Oh, that was boring.’ Sometimes I could make things a lot easier for myself, but I enjoy it. I enjoy them battles, I enjoy being in that dog fight. It’s just all a battle and if you come up short, you come up short, but I prefer it that way than people leaving saying, ‘Wow, he just stunk the place out.’”
Of his father’s great bout with future WBO junior lightweight champion Arthur, Gomez Jnr looks on solemnly when he says he’s only watched it two or three times in his life.
“In my whole life,” he added. “I just don’t feel like you can enjoy it the same. Even now, even though, you know, the outcome [with his dad winning], it’s still a fight that had a massive effect on both of the careers after and life after that. That was one of them fights that took something from both the souls. It’s not something I can enjoy, I’ll be honest with you. It [boxing] definitely ruins fighters. It definitely ruins people’s careers after big fights like that and then, as you know, every fight after a fight like that takes its toll.”
Does Gomez Jnr worry about his own health in the sport?
“It is what it is. I don’t worry about it,” he said flatly. “It’s not something I want, but when you get them gloves on, someone’s trying to take your head off, so you’ve got to go out there and do the same. And if you’re worrying about that, you’re in the wrong game.”
And Gomez knows the stakes are high when he fights Jordan Flynn this week at the Co-op Live Arena in Manchester on Saturday, having said he will retire if he loses. But he has no intention of that being the case.
“No, because I don’t think I’m going to lose this fight,” he said.
A firm Manchester City fan, Gomez Jnr claims he has been more consistent in the gym despite his inactivity. There’s been a hand injury and a defeat in his last fight about a year ago. He’s since had surgery on the damaged hand, too.
“People were raving about me,” he recalled. “I was really hitting top gears. And then, yeah, just unfortunately a bad 12 months. We’ll win on the 28th and I’ll get back and show what I’m capable of again. It’s [the recent past] all forgotten about and we’re back on the road.”
Lessons have been learned. With hindsight, he feels he turned pro too early and while he got off to a good start, winning his first eight, he feels he could have taken his time more.
That is hindsight, of course.
His dad, however, managed to win two British titles in his career.
Junior lightweight Gomez Jnr has set his sights on winning one.
“I want to win a British title,” he said. “That’s the only belt my head and heart is set on. My dad won two of them, so I have to win one. I have to win one, yeah. I have to. I grew up seeing it a fair bit, so I have to win one.”
