Thursday, Sept. 26, 2002 | 9:21 a.m.
Cliff Couser has so many stories, so many anecdotes, that sometimes the difficulty in talking with him or about him is figuring out where to start.
He has an endless succession of tales.
But he's also a quality heavyweight who's looking at a major opportunity to advance his boxing career when he takes on fellow fringe contender Lance Whitaker in a nationally televised fight Oct. 13 from Choctaw, Miss.
Couser needs the win, yet the same holds true for Whitaker.
"I've always wanted to fight him and I've studied tapes of him since he was 17-0," Couser said this week of Whitaker, 24-2-1 with 20 knockouts. "I've been craving a fight with Whitaker because he's a big guy who's been trying hard to get up there, but he also had a lot of chances that were never given to me.
"I've done a lot of things in my life, but every chance I get in boxing is big because I don't get too many of them."
Couser, of Las Vegas, is 24-7-2 with 12 KOs.
"I'm ready to pound this guy real hard," he said of his pending fight with Whitaker, a Californian who is once again being trained by Joe Goossen. "Earlier in my career I didn't have this type of determination, but I do now."
Couser, 31, sees himself fighting for another three years and says "I'll fight my (tail) off" while he's still in the game.
"A lot of times getting a big fight is all politics," he said, "but I know what I can do. I bring people to a fight. People love me."
While such a sentiment certainly has its supporters, it also isn't universally true. Take, for instance, a situation Couser recently faced in which a member of Mike Tyson's camp, Anthony Pitts, allegedly tried to engage Couser in fisticuffs inside the Golden Gloves Gym.
"He was acting strange and glaring at me for no reason and I asked him what his problem was," Couser said. "He (silently) mouthed some stuff and then he said 'Take a swing at me, take a swing at me' and I said to him, 'I would, but then you'd call the cops.'
"Then he said something about my mother and my wife and I dared him to cross a line. Right then Mike (Tyson, Couser's half-brother) stood up for me and told him to knock it off and get out of there.
"I kept my composure and told the guy, 'Why don't you listen to your master?' "
Couser laughs at the incident, a bright smile overtaking his face. The fact that Tyson -- who once denied any relationship with Couser -- had spoken up on his behalf only added to his satisfaction.
Be like Mike
"We get along great these days," he said of Tyson. "I'd say our relationship is wonderful and much better than it once was.
"At first there was no way he wanted anything to do with me, but now everything's cool. He'll give me a hug or a kiss on the cheek and he calls me his half brother."
Couser believes, and apparently Tyson does now too, that they have the same father.
Of course the likeness between Couser and Tyson goes beyond uncanny. Couser is a dead ringer for Tyson not only in a natural, physical sense, but also in that each man has a gold tooth and assorted tattoos.
In addition, Couser can mimic Tyson's expressions and voice and he has played Tyson in a TV movie. He is also mistaken for Tyson almost every day, which has led to occasional bouts with depression.
Yet he knows there are those who feel he is exploitative.
"A lot of people in boxing probably think I'm making things up about being Mike's half brother, and they probably say 'This guy's got problems,' " Couser admits. "But that doesn't bother me anymore. I don't have to make any excuses."
He says he has his emotional issues under control and that his life has stabilized since marrying his charming wife, Charina, whose likeness is now tattooed on his arm.
Just as permanent is Couser's belief that he actually saw Osama bin Laden a mere week after the 9-11-01 terrorist attack on America. As first reported in the Sun a year ago, Couser was training for a Sept. 21, '01 fight with Willie Chapman near Tahkent, Uzbekistan, when he spotted a distinctive man that he didn't recognize by name at the time.
Face in the crowd
"I saw him twice as it turns out and I could take the FBI to the exact spot today if they asked me to," Couser said. "I was out running at about 3 or 4 in the morning and I saw this real tall guy who had four or five people around him. He was wearing white and had a belt on and a hairy face, and they were near an alleyway.
"I didn't know it until later when I got back to the United States and saw a picture of him, but that was bin Laden. I'm very serious, I swear to you: As soon as I saw his picture, I said 'That's the man I saw.' "
The FBI has yet to contact Couser and the country's $25 million bounty on bin Laden goes unclaimed.
"I'd give most of the money away," Couser says of the reward, smiling once again.
Couser wasn't smiling when he left Uzbekistan last year, as he lost that fight to Chapman. But since then he has knocked out James Johnson in two rounds (Dec. 6 at St. Louis) and knocked out Vladislav Andreev in five rounds (Feb. 16 in Donetsk, Uzbekistan).
He thinks his career is on the upswing.
"You're always going to win some and lose some," he said, "but I've always been treated as the underdog. That could change if I win this fight (with Whitaker), and I plan to do it by coming in smart and like a tornado.
"Blood, sweat and tears are going to win this fight for me."
But Whitaker, at 6-foot-6, will stand almost eight inches taller than Couser, who will also be giving up almost 20 pounds.
"I've got some different strategies and I'm going to rough him up," Couser said, demonstrating a couple of tactics. "Seek and destroy, that's my mission."
archive
