Brad Rone (r) — out of shape and suffering from high blood pressure — in the ring with Billy Zumbrun. Rone collapsed after the first round and died of heart failure.
Is It Time To Throw In The Towel?
For at least a decade, boxing's sun has been setting with an epidemic of indictments, bad decisions, fixes, brutal mismatches, absurd ratings and occasional deaths in the ring. The latest blow came in January, when the news broke that the FBI had run a sting operation probing Bob Arum's Top Rank Company—boxing's second-biggest promotional company. Indictments involving fixed fights, deliberate mismatches and forged medical records may come this summer. (Top Rank insists it has done nothing wrong.)
The FBI sting is the latest blow to a sport already riddled with corruption. "Boxing is dirty from top to bottom," says outspoken fight promoter Lou DiBella, once chief of HBO's boxing division. "The sport is dying. It's like a cancer patient on chemo."
The result is that boxing is now at an all-time low in popularity — except when Oscar De La Hoya fights or when the Tyson circus comes to town. And Mike Tyson's slide sadly mirrors the sport's decline: The man who could have been a great champion has turned into a pathetic loser.
Mitchell Rose (r) told the FBI he was offered $5,000 to throw this 1995 fight with Eric 'Butterbean' Esch. Rose claims he had trouble getting fights after he best Butterbean.
Where should we point the finger for the slum boxing has become? Squarely at promoters like Bob Arum and Don King, who have had a stranglehold on the sport. "Arum and King are killing the golden goose," says one veteran manager who doesn't want his name used. "There's a race going on: Do Arum and King retire first or does boxing expire first?"
Boxing is still the only national sport without a national commissioner to enforce safety standards, rules and integrity. Unlike baseball, basketball, football and hockey, boxing has no labor union and no health or pension plan for its athletes. Unless that changes, many believe boxing is going down for the count.
One More Tragic Story
The most recent boxing travesty took place when Brad Rone entered the ring last July 18. Rone, 34, had lost 25 fights in a row. To protect his health and safety, the boxing commission in Nevada would not approve him to fight. Then his mother died, and he didn't have the money to pay for her funeral.
Even though Rone had high blood pressure, and many believe he could not have passed a competent medical exam, he got a fight on one day's notice in Cedar City, Utah. Rone came into the ring grotesquely out of shape. In the first round, he was so unsteady that his opponent, Billy Zumbrun, whispered in his ear, "Are you OK?" Rone collapsed at the end of the first round and was pronounced dead when he arrived at the hospital.
All-American Bastards
Andrew Golota
He calls it a nervous habit. Lennox Lewis calls it a fetish. But here’s the bottom line: To step into the ring with the Polish heavyweight Andrew Golota is to paint a large bull’s-eye around your family jewels. Golota’s low blows aren’t about desperation—they’re strategy. On two separate occasions, the Olympic bronze medalist was beating Riddick Bowe handily—ahead on all scorecards—before he started landing crushing nut shots that got him disqualified. An added attraction: The first Bowe bout ended in a riot in Madison Square Garden, as Riddick’s supporters opened up Golota’s head with a walkie-talkie. "The whole place felt like Wembley Stadium after a bad soccer call,” says David Critchell, a New York Times reporter who was ringside. "There were sixteen arrests and plenty of injuries. It was terrifying, and the whole thing was Golota’s fault.”
"He’s pathetic,” says Bert Sugar, editor of Fight Game magazine. "He’s just a sorry case.” But Golota is no one-trick pony. He once bit an opponent on the neck during a nationally televised fight, and head butted at least one other. And his dirty fighting isn’t confined to the ring; he fled to the United States from Poland back in 1988 to escape assault charges stemming from a bar fight. Hey, we’d shell it out to see him fight Iron Mike.
Don King
As loathsome as bastards are, at least they never killed anyone. (We think.) Boxing promoter Don King did—twice. In 1954 he popped a fellow hood during an attempted robbery of one of King’s gambling dens; it was ruled justifiable homicide. Then in 1966 he pistol-whipped and stomped a loan shark to death; after a tête-à-tête between his lawyer and the judge, charges were reduced to manslaughter. But it wasn’t until he was released from prison in 1971 that he started rocking the boat, when he almost single-handedly took a sport in which guys try to beat each other unconscious and brought it to new levels of depravity.
"He’s fucked up people’s lives; he fucked up the sport,” says Bert Sugar. "He’s the prototypical hustler. After you shake hands with him, you count your rings, and then you count your fingers.” George Foreman calls him the Saddam Hussein of boxing. Mike Tyson, who claims King stole $45 million from him, is suing him for fraud. The Justice Department is also investigating the controversial draw last year between Evander Holyfield and Lennox Lewis, although to this point King has been as much of a Teflon Don as Michael Corleone. But never say Don King’s not persuasive. Larry Holmes recalls that when he was considering leaving King for a rival promoter, King threatened to break his legs. He wasn’t kidding. Actually, come to think of it, we’re just fooling about this whole "most hated” thing, Mr. King. You can take a joke, um, can’t you?
Several days later, there was a double funeral for Rone and his mother back in Ohio. A foundation run by trainer and TV commentator Teddy Atlas paid most of the death expenses.
The Fix Is In
In the recent investigation, heavyweight Mitchell Rose told FBI agents that employees of Top Rank offered him $5000 to throw his Madison Square Garden fight with Eric "Butterbean" Esch in 1995. Esch was being built up by Bob Arum and had a cult following. Rose fought to win and stopped Esch with a technical knockout in the second round. Rose claims he was blacklisted after that fight.
FBI agents have been investigating boxer Verdell Smith about taking dives. Smith has a record of 41 wins and 73 losses and is considered a stiff by some in the trade. He was under surveillance in the FBI sting operation. "The judging in many fights is disgraceful," says Lou DiBella. "The judges are paid by the promoters and picked by the ratings organizations. Judges know the unspoken agenda. It's the equivalent of George Steinbrenner picking the umpires for a playoff game with the Red Sox."
A Ray Of Hope
The chorus asking, "Can boxing be saved?" has been getting louder ever since the FBI's sting went public. Many critics believe a national regulatory commission is the only way to save the sport.
Other sports robustly regulate themselves. The NCAA polices recruiting abuses in college sports. Major league baseball banned Pete Rose for gambling on games. But boxing has had no central authority that can clean its own house. "Only two or three of the state commissions are any good," says Jose Torres, the former light heavyweight champion and former chairman of New York's boxing commission. "The rest are worthless. There should be a single national commission to govern boxing."
Now there is hope for boxing reform. On March 31, the U.S. Senate passed a bill by Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.) creating the United States Boxing Administration. The bill gives this national commission the power to enforce uniform health and safety standards and to establish a centralized medical registry. "I have derived great pleasure from boxing over the years," says Senator McCain, who was a boxer himself as an undergraduate at the U.S. Naval Academy. "But I continue to be disgusted by recurring scandals and corruption. Boxing desperately needs strict regulation."
The bill is now pending in the House, where its chief sponsor is Rep. Peter King (R., N.Y.). "I'm optimistic we can fast-track this bill and enact it this session," King says.
The idea of a national commission has its opponents. Among them is Murad Muhammad, who promoted many of Roy Jones Jr.'s championship fights. "You can't change 100 years of tradition," Muhammad says. But most of us who have loved the fight game believe we are at a crossroads: We will either have a national commission or else boxing will be driven underground.
Should Boxing Be Saved?
Lou DiBella believes, "boxing will never completely die because violence and sex are in people's blood." If boxing goes underground, it will become human cockfighting. Should we, as a society, care? I grew up in a poor Brooklyn neighborhood where fighters were respected. The fighters I have come to know as a writer generally have been more honorable and likable than politicians. I see the brutality and the corruption of the sport, but I also see the balletic grace, the courage and the intelligence behind it. Boxing is the raw, narrative drama of physical conflict with a hero and a loser.
On its rare best nights, fights like the ones between Ali and Frazier can reveal character and will and bravery that can be as uplifting as a symphony or a play. As former heavyweight champ George Foreman says, "Boxing is the sport that all other sports aspire to be." But even I have reached the point where I don't want to watch boxing anymore unless it is cleaned up and the rights and safety of the fighters are protected.
Boxing Movies
Rocky (1976) Director John Avildsen says Rocky's and Adrian's skating scene resonates for him; we like Sly brutalizing a side of beef.
Stars: Sylvester Stallone, Talia Shire, Carl Weathers, Burgess Meredith Director: John G. Avildsen
Why It's No. 1: No question about it. In a genre rife with films about boxing's seamy underside, this tale of a club fighter who gets a shot at the title is the feel-good sports movie of all time. If you don't get a lump in your throat at the end, you're as cold as the sides of beef Rocky sparred against. In America's bicentennial year Rocky Balboa became the first of the post-Vietnam War heroes, a frenzied expression of old-fashioned individualism. A slow-on-the-uptake palooka who gets a chance to survive a fight with the heavyweight champ (Apollo Creed, played with panache by Weathers), Balboa has a Philadelphia story with heart and purity and just enough cruelty for resonance. Stallone informed his loser with a colossal goofiness that was impossible not to watch. He was so convincingly sincere that audiences actually jumped up and screamed for him to win.
Memorable Moment: In a rousing montage of sparring, weight-lifting and running scenes — perhaps you've heard the Rocky theme — Rocky (Stallone) trains for the fight of his life. The shot on the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art is positively spine-tingling. We'll pass on the raw eggs, though.
They Said It: "It really don't matter if I lose this fight. It really don't matter if this guy opens my head, either. 'Cause all I wanna do is go the distance. Nobody's ever gone the distance with Creed, and if I can go that distance, you see, and that bell rings and I'm still standin', I'm gonna know for the first time in my life, see, that I weren't just another bum from the neighborhood." — Rocky explaining to his girlfriend (Shire) why he wants to fight.
Look For: Rocky's dog, Butkus. A bull mastiff, Butkus was actually Stallone's real-life dog.
Runner-Up:Raging Bull (1980). Robert De Niro's amazing performance carries this unblinking biography of Jake LaMotta. Many still it consider director Martin Scorsese's best work, but frankly it's a film more to be respected than enjoyed. A fight film like no other, it charges at you headfirst, the way its savage protagonist did in the ring. Adapted from Jake La Motta's candid confessions and filmed in garish black-and-white, Raging Bull is a sort of anti-Rocky. Director Martin Scorsese presents La Motta's bouts as masterly edited one-act miniatures and goes toe-to-toe with fight-film clichés: He neither romanticizes La Motta nor "explains" the anger that drives the champ inside and outside the ring. De Niro's unsparing portrait of this opaque, repellent villain is poignant in its precision — even his silences are smoldering. It's so widely (and deservedly) praised that no one points out that the stylized boxing scenes are utterly unrealistic. Martin Scorsese's masterpiece is gritty, ugly and difficult to watch, but De Niro's tour de force performance captures boxing better than any Hollywood happy pill.
Contenders:
Cinderella Man (2005): The story of Depression-era fighter (Russell Crowe) and folk hero Jim Braddock, who defeated heavyweight champ Max Baer in a 15-round slugfest in 1935.
Fat City (1972): An ex-fighter (Stacy Keach) to his protégé (Jeff Bridges), "Before you get rolling, your life makes a beeline for the drain"
Body and Soul (1947): Few movie lines are colder than the one delivered by the gangster (Lloyd Gough) as he studies a boxer with a blood clot: "Everybody dies."
Requiem for a Heavyweight (1962): As the washed-up fighter trying to avoid selling out as a pro wrestler, Anthony Quinn gives an immortal performance.
The Harder They Fall (1956): The film ends with Humphrey Bogart once again seeing someone off at the airport, but it ain't Ingrid Bergman.
Gentleman Jim (1942): Errol Flynn was never better — or better looking, both in and out of the ring.
The Set-Up (1949): There's an exquisite Playhouse 90 tautness to this boxing drama, which was directed by Robert Wise.
Champion (1949): Powerful drama based on a story by Ring Lardner and set amid the world of pro boxing.
Jack Newfield. Published: May 2, 2004. Should We Let Boxing Die? PARADE Magazine. May 10, 2004.
