ESPN Releases Kimbo Slice Feature

Courtesy of ESPN.com

ESPN The Magazine’s anticipated cover story on EliteXC heavyweight sensation Kevin “Kimbo Slice” Ferguson hit newsstands nationwide on Wednesday and is now available for public viewing on at The Mag’s official website. (Cover picture here)

The story, entitled “Not Quite What You Were Thinking” and written by Miami Herald reporter and frequent ESPN contributor, Dan Le Batard, chronicles Ferguson’s journey from being homeless in 1994 all the way to becoming one of mixed martial arts hottest prospects today.

An excerpt from the piece:

Let’s rewind to the most desperate time in the desperate life of a desperate man. Before he traveled by stretch Navigator limo and private jet. Before rap stars requested his menace in their videos. Before Randy Moss approached him like an awestruck teen. Or Jason Taylor wanted the best seats to watch him fight. Or Lamar Odom said, “Manny Ramirez was born to swing a bat. Peyton Manning was born to throw a football. And Kimbo Slice was born to kick ass.” You know, before he made that clichéd climb from strip-club bouncer to porn bodyguard to street-brawling Internet legend to broadcast-TV star, ho-hum.

Kimbo Slice—real name Kevin Ferguson—was homeless 14 years ago. He lived out of a green, 1987 Pathfinder that had four mismatched tires. He taped plastic bags to the shattered window to keep most of the rain out. He bathed in the ocean and pools and went to the bathroom wherever he could. He was too proud to live with his mother but not too proud to wash the cars of strangers when he got turned down for menial jobs. And that mind of his—the one that has surprised the CBS suits trying to morph him into an MMA star, that convinced them to sign him for MMA’s network debut on May 31—drowned in shame.

In my opinion, the article was extremely well done and is a must-read for anyone that has a one-sided opinion of Slice.

Just one week from Saturday, Slice will be headlining the first-ever live MMA event on CBS as he takes on PRIDE veteran and fellow heavy-hitter James Thompson in the main event of EliteXC’s “Primetime” event, which emanates from the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey on May 31st.

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