Aging Lifestyle & Culture Sports

Ex-boxer aids residents of his boyhood, Brooklyn neighborhood

By Jaxon Gay

Before Shannon Briggs was “The Cannon,” a World Boxing Organization heavyweight champion, he was just a kid growing up in the 1980s and ‘90s in a rough, tough Brownsville, Brooklyn neighborhood. 

He’d never met his father. Before a heroin addiction derailed his mother’s life, she had enrolled him in private school. To occupy her son when he was out of class, she treated him to such things as an entire set of collectable toys based on the Battlestar Galactica sci-fi series.

But her addiction, said Briggs, now 54, “consumed a big portion of her life.” He got home from school one day to find an eviction notice on the front door of the apartment the two of them shared. Suddenly homeless, he slept on friends’ couches. 

He could have fallen into a life of crime, as many of his peers did, Briggs said. But being introduced to Brooklyn’s Starrett City Boxing Club re-directed him. Shadowboxing, jumping rope, sparring and other parts of his training helped him turn his anger into something constructive. 

“Anybody and everybody that went against me was going to get knocked out fast,” Cannon said, recently, as he discussed how boxing helped him succeed in and out of the ring.

He shares those and other parts of his story during regular visits to his old neighborhood, a place he’s still passionate about, Briggs said. It’s a focus of a legacy he is creating. 

After retiring from boxing in 2016, he began investing in businesses. Partnering with Applied Bioscience, as well as launching the Let’s Go Champ! clothing line. Parts of its profits go back to Brownsville, he said. 

His “Champ” podcast teaches viewers ways to become entrepreneurs. Also, Briggs said, he is partnering with city officials to build a boxing academy for Brownsville youth, especially those in tough circumstances. 

“In a hundred years, if a kid can watch my stories and be inspired,” Briggs said, “I want that.”