Previously: 10, 9, 8
7. Staying at altitude too long makes you start to feel Goofi: Lance Whitaker vs. Jameel McCline (watch it on YouTube)
History has taught us there are mixed results when a celebrity legally changes their name, mid-career.
When heavyweight champion Cassius Clay announced he would now be known as Muhammad Ali, at first the public bristled. But by the time the fearless wisdom of his principled stance against the Vietnam war fully came to light, the world embraced the man and his new name.
Things can go wrong too, though. Garth Brooks’ 1999 attempt to rename himself as rock singer Chris Gaines was a hilariously huge flop, and the country star quickly abandoned the new persona.
And then, there’s Goofi.
GOOFI!!!!
In late 2001, heavyweight contender Lance Whitaker, 23-1 (19 KOs), was a summiting commodity. At the time, the towering six-foot, eight-inch Southern Californian had only lost once (to eventual Mike Tyson victim Lou Savarese) and was coming off a career-best second-round knockout over respectable Russian heavyweight contender Oleg Maskaev.
Up to this point, the towering Whitaker had gone by the apt nickname “Mount.”
Lance “Mount” Whitaker.
But having teamed up with former Riddick Bowe manager “Rock” Newman, the pair launched the bizarre rebrand before Whitaker’s HBO-televised showdown against appropriately nicknamed fellow up-and-coming contender Jameel “Big Time” McCline.
Whitaker’s new nickname was supposedly meant to describe his fun-loving personality away from the ring, as he considered himself a jokester.
As you can probably guess by now, Whitaker told the world with a straight face that he was changing his name to GOOFI.
Goofi.
The unusual spelling was reportedly to stave off a lawsuit from the folks at Disney. And not one to do things halfway, Whitaker crossed the Rubicon of sanity by LEGALLY changing his name to Goofi.
Who knows what Newman and Whitaker thought would happen because of this stroke of marketing genius, but the result was an unintentionally hilarious night of HBO’s Boxing After Dark.
It started with Goofi’s ring walk, where the giant heavyweight, looking a little sheepish, led a procession of children (presumably paid crisis actors) holding up signs over their heads that said… you guessed it… Goofi, while chanting his new name on a loop. Whitaker smiled occasionally and rubbed one of the kids’ heads to show he was… I don’t know. Something.
The HBO crew had a tongue-in-cheek good time with the name as well, making countless borderline sarcastic mentions of the new moniker during the broadcast that included commentator Jim Lampley saying things like, “Larry, let’s take a closer look at… uh… Goofi,” or “Goofi looks discouraged.”
As for the fight itself, Goofi had reason to look discouraged, as he lost a clear unanimous decision to McCline.
Undeterred by the setback, Whitaker fought on under the name for 15 more fights, including losing a WBO Heavyweight title eliminator to Luan Krasniqi in May 2005 before retiring in 2010.
Not one of boxing’s classic nights, but certainly an unforgettable one.
