Mr. Keeney

      What I would like for you to dwell on tonight is first of all, I heard a person say one time that you can tell a person's character by the type of people they associate themselves with. I would like to say that you all must have some kind of fine character to have chosen a man like Mr. McCoy to associate yourselves with. I am very proud to have him as my Kentucky State Representative and we just made him a lifetime member of the P.K.C. earlier tonight because we want him with us as long as he is willing to be with us.

      The other thing I would like to stress upon you is that we are very lucky because karate has in the P.K.C and most generally across the United States a very good reputation. There are very few areas where you mention the word karate the people think of it as something bad. They think of it as being something good. We owe that to the people that came before us. The people that established the guidelines for what kind of respect and humility that karate people are supposed to have. Now for you people here tonight, especially you people that are student of the month recipients, and for you leaders within this karate club and for you young people who are going to become champions. 

       The greatest thing that you can ever accomplish in your lifetime, in my opinion, is that you have the opportunity to influence other human beings in a positive manner. How many lawyers, doctors, and teachers do we have here? We've got a few of them and these are very fortunate people because they have the opportunity to influence many people in their lifetime in a positive manner. 

      You as karate people need to realize, and I charge you with it tonight, that karate in school, karate at your job is cool! People look at you as karate people so you have been given the opportunity if you are willing to take it and follow Mr. McCoy and his beliefs. You have been given the opportunity to possibly influence other people by your actions and you have got to keep this in mind. Ricky Roufus I don't know if a lot of you knew him, but he hits a lot of T.V. I've seen him one time about four years ago when he lost a match (in Chicago) to Marek Piotrowski, the first person he ever lost to and he came out of the ring and has a good guy, but he was disappointed and walked over to the wall hit throws his equipment in the wall, hits the wall three times, and walks toward the dressing room. There's a bunch of kids following him. This one kid looked at him as soon as he left. The kid walked over to this wall hit it three times and then walked off just like Rick Roufus. This is what I'm trying to tell you.

      Realize you are the karate leaders, your going to be the karate future, and your going to be a champion. One action from you may or may not influence another person to do better or worse, along with this comes responsibility. Accept the responsibility and do good with it. 
 
    I went and got Rick and I told him that he has made a mistake and he said, “Mr. Keeney sometimes I forget”. He went and talked to this young man. He realized that both of them had made a mistake. Both of them was going to do better. Through karate if you can do this like I've said the greatest thing that they can put on your tombstone is here lies whoever you know, in his lifetime he influenced many, many people in a positive manner and that is what it's all about.

      I would like to thank Mr. McCoy again for having me here and I am looking for great things in all you people. I know that if you follow his lead that this could happen. Now I'm going to make you mad because Mr. McCoy has got his own way of running his schools and I know this, but Barry (you know I don't even call you Barry) this is Mr. McCoy or Sensei McCoy to you young people. In my karate clubs if a young man is thirteen years old and another man is forty, he stills gets called mister. This is something young people need to learn and carry out, especially in the south, that's what your famous for. This is Mr. McCoy here. Sensei McCoy. This is not Barry. I call him Mr. McCoy.

Thank you

About Mr. Keeney

PKC Headquarters

Blackbelt Hall of Fame

Mr. Keeney's PKA World Champion Ross Scott