Retiring was just a feint for a Brooklyn boxer whose former business manager alleges he quit boxing to avoid paying a $128,000 management bill.
Yuri Foreman, an ordained rabbi, became Israel’s first boxing champion when he took the World Boxing Association’s super-welterweight title in 2009.
Then the boxing game laid him low. He lost two straight bouts, in June 2010 and March 2011.
“He suffered from low visibility in the sports world since he lost his title and became injured,” according to his ex-manager, Leonard Zimmerman.
Foreman wanted a comeback. So he hooked up with Zimmerman, who developed a two-pronged strategy to raise his profile and improve his career. In return, Zimmerman says he was due 20 percent of Foreman’s winnings, plus expenses.
The manager says he shelled out $8,000 to help Foreman and his wife become legal US residents, ending “a huge distraction” for the star. Zimmerman also gave the fighter $2,000 a month in living expenses for the 11 months they worked on reviving his career, along with an $8,000 signing bonus, he claims in a lawsuit.
Zimmerman covered expenses for Foreman and his entourage, spent $10,000 to revamp Foreman’s Web site and helped the boxer make a documentary to raise his profile, according to the suit in Manhattan Supreme Court.
Then, in January 2013, after a hiatus of nearly two years, Foreman stepped back into the ring, winning a bout by a unanimous decision. He won his next three fights in April, July and November of that year.
Foreman was reaching new heights — and Zimmerman figured he was due a payday.
Instead, Foreman blew him off, Zimmerman charges.
Foreman, who lives in Park Slope, abruptly retired right before a scheduled May 2014 bout at Madison Square Garden that carried a $60,000 purse, his biggest to that date, Zimmerman claims.
Foreman counterpunched his ex-manager’s allegations by calling Zimmerman too “unprofessional and untrustworthy to continue working with.”
He told The Post that Zimmerman rejected his offer to reimburse his expenses.
“He was asking me instead to pay him back three times the amount he spent on me,” Foreman charged.
Zimmerman denied that, saying Foreman ignored his “numerous attempts” to resolve the “contract dispute.”
“Foreman’s retirement was completely bogus and done specifically to sidestep the contract with Lenco Management [Zimmerman’s company],” the manager’s suit says. “He never had any actual intention of retiring.”
Foreman, who pals around with actor Liev Schreiber and has playfully sparred with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at Gleason’s Gym, resumed boxing at Brooklyn’s Barclays Center in December 2015.
He won his fight against Lenwood Dozier, as well as another bout on June 3 at Resorts World Casino in Queens against Jason Davis.