W. Baldini has been a sports journalist since 1987 (Photo: Reproduction/Twitter)
A reference in Brazilian sports journalism, Wilson Baldini Júnior from São Paulo brought an incredible 'marathon' to boxing fans last weekend. The specialist in the noble art did a 'live' that lasted 24 hours, starting at 22pm on Saturday (28) and ending in the early hours of Sunday (29) to Monday (30). In an exclusive interview with SUPER FIGHTS, 'Baldo' told what it was like to live this unusual experience and made a sad outburst criticizing how the sport is treated in Brazil.
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“I did this because talking about boxing in Brazil, writing about boxing in Brazil, being a journalist for 35 years like I am, is not easy. We don't get any recognition, not in our own jobs or from the public. Boxing is a 'marginalized' sport in Brazil, in the sense that it is left aside. If a new Popó appears tomorrow, then the press will remember boxing. Boxing was the most successful sport at the Tokyo Olympics and nothing was done. Beatriz Ferreira has 29 podiums in 30 international events in the last seven years and I can't get an article about her in the newspaper. I did these 24 hours for myself and for boxing. And I'll do it other times, I won't do it now. I'll have to wait a bit, because physically I really felt it. Maybe I'll change the time, wait for a weekend with big fights and have it broadcast to Brazil, which is difficult and then we'll do it again.”
Motivation for the live
“Look, I always thought that these one-hour lives, an hour or so, that you do because of a fight… I always thought they were very poor, right? I have a channel (on YouTube) and although it is still small, the audience that goes there is desperate to ask questions, because they want information and there is none, right? So, I always end lives thinking I can do a little more. And it was something I had been thinking about doing for a long time, which is a long live. Once I did a three-hour live stream. But one day I said: 'I'm going to do a 24-hour live'. Then my wife said 'I was crazy, I had been drinking'. It was very tiring, in the end, I was psychologically destroyed, but happy, to be able to do a business that I had wanted for a long time”.
Duration of the special and obstacles during the night
“I started at 22:28 on Saturday night (00) and went until 00:05 from Sunday to Monday. What motivated me was the fact that there were two good fights: Gervonta Davis x Rolando Romero, for the WBA (World Boxing Association) lightweight belt on Saturday and Esquiva Falcão on Sunday, both broadcast to Brazil. So I said: 'I'm going to fix everything'. On Sunday during the day, I did two interviews and one of them was with Tarso Dória (host of SUPER LUTAS). And the worst problem was the early morning, because generally, early morning is more difficult, I couldn't sleep on Saturday afternoon and during the day, so I was very tired. But after 00:XNUMX am, I woke up and managed to do it with the help of Twitter and topics that I had set aside to talk about throughout the day.”
Did you think about giving up at any point?
“No, at no point did I think about giving up. Because I didn't think about it from one day to the next, I had been thinking about it for about two months or so. The problem was that, if you see the video, I'm talking about there, suddenly, I 'black out', I simply fall asleep awake. I was talking, I closed my eyes, and when I opened them, I was talking about something completely different. But this happened in the early hours of the morning, so if I do this again, I will schedule the interviews for the early hours of the morning. I did the interviews on Sunday morning, if I had done them in the early hours of the morning, I would have stayed awake. Or maybe, if I had one more person with me in the final stretch. My wife even sat next to me at the end, because she saw that I was completely exhausted at the end of the broadcast.”
About Wilson Baldini Junior
Wilson Baldini JR is 55 years old and has been a journalist since 1987. A journalist specializing in boxing, 'Baldo' has worked for major newsrooms and newspapers such as O Estado de São Paulo, Rádio Jovem Pan, ESPN and BandSports. He is also the author of the book “Mike Tyson – A Life of Knockouts.”
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