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.
Kimbo Sliceβreal name Kevin Fergusonβwas homeless 14 years ago. He lived out of a green, 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.
It hadn't always been so. Two years earlier, in , Ferguson had been a middle linebacker at Miami's Palmetto High with the skill to think college ball. Palmetto's season was shortened, and Ferguson's scholarships disappeared. He tried college at Bethune-Cookman but flunked out. By early , he was out on the street.
And that time makes the 6'2", pound, year-old badass cry to this day, just thinking about living and dying in the stink of that damn truck. Which is saying something. This is a man, mind you, who still wears the scars from Hurricane Andrew on his body, like slashes on a gladiator's shield.
He hid under a mattress that night as debris pelted him and his mother's home crumbled. But at least he had a mattress then. And no six kids and their two moms to feed or fail. While in that truck, Ferguson talked to himself and to God and asked both to please keep him from temptation and deliver him from evil.
