Paul Williams paralyzed in motorcycle accident

Two time welterweight champion, Paul “The Punisher” Williams is now in the fight of his life. Williams has been paralyzed from the waist down in a motorcycle accident Sunday morning in Marietta, Georgia. Williams has been listed in serious but stable condition after severing his spinal cord. Surgery is scheduled for Wednesday to try to stabilize his spinal column.

For a while Williams was known as the most avoided man in boxing until he endured a knockout loss to Sergio Martinez in a rematch from an earlier fight. Williams was scheduled to take on Saul Alvarez on September 15 in Las Vegas. His manager, George Peterson said Williams probably will never fight again.

The two-time welterweight champion Williams was in Marietta, Ga., to attend his brother’s wedding on Monday and was driving back from the bachelor party around 7 a.m. on Sunday when he got into the accident, Peterson said. Williams was going around a curb when he swerved out of the way of a driver of a car who was on the inside lane that Williams told Peterson was “on his cell phone.”

“He got separated from the motorcycle and must have gone about 65 feet in the air,” said Peterson, who left Williams’ side in the Atlanta area hospital to speak to the Daily News. He declined to give the name of the hospital to protect Williams’ privacy.


“He was doing about 75 mph on the motorcycle. When he came down, he came down on his back and when he came down on his back, of course he severed his spinal cord. He’s paralyzed from the waist down. In terms of him walking again… that will never happen.”

Peterson said that Williams is still in good spirits and believes that he’ll box again.

“It’s the same old Paul,” Peterson said. “As I was walking out of the door to talk to you, he said, ‘Believe me, if I don’t ever box again, I’m going to do some stand-up comedy.’ He’s not suffering.”


“From the waist down, he has absolutely no movement. He’s in very good spirits, though,” Peterson told The Associated Press from his home in Aiken, South Carolina. “He still believes he’s going to fight again.”


The fight with Alvarez would have been one of the better fights of the year, but since it’s now off, it’s time for Williams to give thanks that he’s still alive and try to attempt to walk again.

Ringside Thoughts

After watching a great fight between Paul Williams and Sergio Martinez,if I didn’t feel this already,something needs to be done about the judging system in boxing.Both Williams and Martinez,who are respected but can’t seem to get a good fight put on a show.They’re kinda like boxing vagabonds taking any fight from welterweight to super middleweight.
  The travesty to the fight was the scoring.Both fighters scored early knockdowns,although Martinez’s was more impressive and landed heavy shots.Williams pulled out a majority decision,a decision that I thought should have been a draw.One judge scored it 114-114,another 115-113 and the other 119-110.I don’t know what fight that judge was watching,but it should have been a whole lot closer than that.Martinez was gracious in defeat,but he acknowledged he felt he got a bad decision.There should be a rematch made for this fight,but there probably won’t as I feel Williams knows he went through an escape hatch to win this one.Williams was his usual agressive self,throwing punches at a high volume.Martinez is more slick and quick,but landed plenty of crunching blows to Williams.Overall it was a great fight and would love to see them do it again.Both fighters should be in line for a big money fight,but with the well known politics of boxing I think both will keep being avoided.

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