Kennedy McKinney

Kennedy McKinney ( born January 10, 1966 in Hernando, Mississippi ) is a retired American boxer.

Amateur

McKinney was between 1985 and 1988 placed at the U.S. championships in fly and bantamweight always among the top three, but never won the title. After the championship in 1988 but he was able to prevail at the U.S. Olympic Trials against its competitors Michael Collins and Jemal Hinton and thus qualified for participation in the Olympic Games in Seoul. There he won after beating Erik Perez, Guyana (RSC 1 ) Shahuraj Birajdor, India ( where), the winner of the Pan-African Games 1987 Stephen Mwema, Kenya (5:0), Phajol Moolsan, Thailand ( RSC 1 ) and the favored European champion Alexandar Hristov, Bulgaria (5-0 ) the gold medal in the bantamweight.

Professional

In 1989 Mckinney into the professional business, but he could never become a star in his homeland. With a victory over Paul Banke in 1992, he qualified for a title fight the IBF Association in Superbatamgewicht against undefeated South African Welcome Ncita, which took place on 2 December 1992 in Sardinia. Ncita marched all the time on McKinney and these had to put up with much. He remained quietly in his typical way and never lost the overview, even as the Africans beat him to the ground. When he then wanted to knock him out, McKinney saw in the eleventh round the gap and achieved his hand with a right hook a heavy knockout. In McKinney's words: "You could count to 1,000. "

But even so he was not the center of attention in the United States. He defended his title with a spectacular performance against the highly traded Rudy Zavala (KO) and hit Ncita in the rematch on points, went during the fight but back to the ground. McKinney lost the title in August 1994 at the relatively unknown Vuyany Bungu of South Africa

1996 McKinney called the WBO champion Marco Antonio Barrera out, but was largely chance and lost prematurely. The following year, he also lost the rematch for the IBF title against Bungu on points.

Another chance at a world title he received on 19 December 1997 against Junior Jones, who had beaten Barrera sensational before. McKinney surprisingly won by TKO in the fourth round. McKinney tried now in hopes of a high combat exchange another fight against Barrera or the British Naseem Hamed to get, as this did not succeed, he rose to the featherweight and fought the Filipino veterans Luisito Espinosa for the WBC title and lost already in the second round by TKO.

McKinney boxed sporadically until 2003, he ended his career.