The Beast of Stillman's Gym, Part 6…TOLEDO

Published

12 years ago

January 30, 2012

beast- Middleweight Bert Lytell meets light heavyweight Archie Moore, 1950

PART 6: “THE WORLD’S MOST FEARED MIDDLEWEIGHT”

Rocky Graziano’s manager stood in a gym in a Massachusetts mill town watching Johnny Eagle train and was impressed enough to pick him to upset Bert Lytell. It was wishful thinking. Bert took a unanimous decision, snapping Eagle through the ropes along the way. There might have been a message in that. Bert had been spouting off to the press about Graziano, accusing him of “repeatedly refusing to sign for a match.” He believed he would eventually “force” the Italian bomber to reconsider. That too would prove to be wishful thinking.

In April 1947 Bert faced Sam Baroudi in New York. French superstar Marcel Cerdan was there scouting for his third match on American soil. Baroudi was a dangerous boxer-puncher coming up like a “like a house a fire” and Bert took him apart –-he took him apart while Cerdan sat ringside and thought up excuses not to fight him.

Bert’s long-awaited rematch with Jake LaMotta was set for May at Madison Square Garden with the winner to meet Tony Zale for the middleweight championship of the world. It fell through and was rescheduled for September. That date was cancelled after a physician from the New York State Athletic Commission examined LaMotta’s hands, which had been badly bruised in a bout only a few days before. Finally, a date in January 1948 was reserved, again at Madison Square Garden. It too was cancelled after LaMotta was suspended during an investigation into his suspicious loss to Billy Fox.

Cerdan, who didn’t terrorize the American field so much as tiptoe through it, got the title shot in September and defeated Zale for the middleweight crown.

His first defense would be against none other than the Bronx Bull.

LaMotta had finally caved in to Mob pressure. A man with a toothpick in his mouth approached him one day in the gym and made an offer. “Throw the fight with Fox,” he said, “and you’ll get a title shot.” LaMotta threw him out, but then got to thinking. He took a walk a few nights later, a long one, and the ruthless truth met him along the way:

You want to be “the champ” more than anything, but you’ve made all the wrong enemies. You’re too stubborn to do business with Frankie Carbo and too stupid to see what you’re up against. It’s the Mob that is the establishment here, my friend, and it’s the Mob that holds all the strings. You’ve been swapping blows with colored bombers for years and just like them you’re making chump change and going nowhere.

You and your “pride.” Your pride and a dime can get you into the subway, but it will never get you what you want most.

And that was that. LaMotta would stop Cerdan in ten rounds and got what he wanted most. “It felt like God had given me the world,” he said afterwards.

Those four kings –-LaMotta, Cerdan, Zale, and Graziano-– reigned during Bert’s rampage. Not one of them would have been any more than even money to beat him. It was a tragic irony, really. There he was fighting out of perhaps the greatest gym in boxing history with well-connected managers and a crowd-pleasing style and it didn’t matter. It just didn’t matter.

He was like bitter coffee that no one wanted to drink; too black, too strong, and as it turned out, too honest.

HAVE GUNS, WILL TRAVEL

The late Allen Rosenfeld remembered hanging around Stillman’s when a “wave of excitement” erupted around him. “Bert Lytell was in the gym,” he recalled. Rosenfeld ran upstairs and saw a “pleasant and friendly looking” boxer skipping rope and working the speed bag. He heard the regulars muttering “no one will fight him.”

Murderers’ Row seethed with top contenders that no one would fight, but Bert was off by himself even among them. He went after anyone, even other hard cases. Not many dared hunt LaMotta in the mid 1940s. Bert did. No one in their right mind went after a destroyer like Ezzard Charles. Bert did; he even offered to donate his purse to charity.

The buzz was that he was “the world’s most feared middleweight” and he’d migrate overseas to prove it. When he came back from a month-long campaign in the Caribbean, The Ring ranked him number one. He’d also migrate across weight divisions. In December 1948, he was scheduled to confront the second-ranked light heavyweight in the world, and his manager was barking even before he won. He publically offered Cerdan both purses if he agreed to meet Bert for the title: “All we want is training expenses. If we win tonight’s fight and Cerdan still ignores our challenge then we’ll go after the light heavyweight crown.”

Two kings –-Freddie Mills and Joey Maxim-– reigned during Bert’s light heavyweight rampage; neither of them would have been any more favored to beat him than their middleweight counterparts.

Despite his status as an apex contender in two divisions, he had to stay in condition like a ham-and-egger in hopes of earning enough purses to get by. He’d fight anyone, anytime, and there isn’t even a rumor that says otherwise. Managers desperate to find a last-minute substitute knew where to find him. One day a call came into Stillman’s from Ohio to offer Bert a purse of $734.86 (minus expenses) to fight a light heavyweight named Bob Amos. Bert arrived in Dayton on Sunday, trained Tuesday and Wednesday, and was ready by Thursday night. Amos’s trainer was Eddie Futch, who peered sorrowfully through the ropes while his fighter got belted around the ring for ten rounds. “Lytell crowded Amos from the outset, and seldom let up,” said the Dayton Daily News, “Bert’s style –-and it’s a varied one, because he really knows his way around that ring–- had Amos worried from the start and frequently befuddled thereafter.” Futch never wanted Lytell for his boy in the first place.

There were sightings as far off as California. A crowd gathered around the ring in Harry Fine’s gym and watched him stand up to a mountain and chop it down with both hands. The mountain was 6’4, 220 lb Leroy Evans. Bert was 5’8.

A few days later he was swarming all over the heavy-punching Oakland Billy Smith.

Smith was meat for Murderers’ Row, but that didn’t mean he went down easy. When Bert faced Smith again in Cincinnati, “Both fighters wrestled to the floor several times,” the AP reported, and “at one point, were trading punches while sitting on the canvas.” The AP failed to report that at another point Smith spit in Bert’s face. He was suspended in Cincinnati after that one, though a cursory glance at some of his other misadventures suggests that he should have been committed.

Before Bert, there was Newsboy Millich. Millich got to Smith by whispering indecent things into his ear and fouling him in close, so Smith started kicking him. After Bert, there was Jersey Joe Walcott. Walcott hired Smith as a sparring partner in the early 50s. Smith would show up to work wearing a yellow turtleneck and a harness with straps dangling around his knees. No one could say why, least of all Billy. In one session, Smith hit Walcott so hard the heavyweight champ did an “involuntary shuffle” and Walcott responded with a right hand that froze Smith in suspended animation. In another session, Smith fled the ring.

It wasn’t the first time he fled the ring. “Disappearing” Billy Smith, as he became known, gave reporters plenty of material. In the eighth round of his fourth fight against Archie Moore, Smith turned away from Moore and was heard yelling “shut up” toward his corner when Moore nailed him. Smith went down, got up at the count of five, parted the ropes, and took off toward the dressing room. The next day he appeared before the boxing commission to explain what happened. “I was hurt, but only mentally” he said to several raised eyebrows. “All through the fight [my corner] kept yelling ‘one-two’, ‘one-two’ and what happened? Archie gave me a one-two to the head,” Smith said, “Bert Lytell punished me two months ago in Texas, and I didn’t aim to go through that again. It took me more than a month to recover from that beating.”

THE ELIMINATION BOUT

Where Smith was meat for Murderers’ Row, Archie Moore was a master of it. He was also one of Bert’s early mentors at Stillman’s Gym.

Bert fought Moore on even terms for seven rounds. He shifted behind a right jab and fought a style that was, according to the Baltimore Sun, “as elusive as plans for a Stadium roof.” Moore was outworked in close during rounds four and five but landed flush rights when he could find the bobbing and weaving target. After the seventh round, Moore’s thirteen-pound weight advantage came into play and he rumbled ahead to take a decision. Bert had a victory of sorts –he never staggered and never went down against one of the most destructive punchers of the last century.

The rematch was on January 31^st 1950. It was the most important bout of Bert’s career. According to the matchmaker for Madison Square Garden, Moore-Lytell II was really an “elimination bout” that would decide the next challenger for light heavyweight champion Joey Maxim.

As a new resident of Toledo, Ohio, Moore didn’t have to travel far to the Sports Arena. He entered the ring to the cheers of a friendly crowd and sported a nine-pound weight advantage, a three-inch height advantage, and considerably more experience. Despite it all, Bert proved that he was at least the equal of Moore. The Toledo Blade reported only “a hair margin dividing any of the rounds.” Both fighters, “past masters at the art of defense had a hard time breaking through” as punches were almost invariably “caught on the gloves, arms, or shoulders.” The decision was announced for Moore and 7300 of his new neighbors erupted not in cheers but in protest. Bert stood in defiance across the ring; nose bloody, pride intact.

It did no good for either man. Bert lost –-whether or not he was robbed didn’t matter. Moore would have only one more fight in 1950 because no one wanted to risk their record. And the title shot he was promised? It was nothing more than the promise of a politician. The fine print of the agreement said that Maxim and his manager had to agree to terms –-and it took time coming to terms with losing the title.

It took three years. At Christmastime 1952, Archie Moore finally fought for the championship of the world. He was 36 years old. Fate bought him a bus ticket out of Murderers’ Row and escorted him into the company of kings.

By then, the career of Bert Lytell had tanked.

____________________________

Did Bert Lytell retire? Nope. A mysterious offer is made that he can’t refuse, and he refuses anyway –with severe consequences. Read all about it in PART 7 OF “THE BEAST OF STILLMAN’S GYM.”

The graphic is from the Toledo Blade, 1/30/50.

Irving Cohen’s bet in Berkshire Evening Eagle 10/17,18/46; 4/21/47. Dick Friendlich’s “Boxing Briefs” in San Francisco Chronicle undated. New York Herald-Tribune 4/7,8/47; The Stars and Stripes, 12/16/48. LaMotta cancellations, AP 9/9/47 and New York Times 11/22/47. Cerdan Kansas City Times 12/14/48. LaMotta makes a deal in Raging Bull pp. 159-164, 169. Passenger manifest, Pan American Airways, Inc. 11/2/1948. Allen S. Rosenfeld’s memories at Stillman’s in Charley Burley: The Life and Hard Times of an Uncrowned Champion, p. 500. Lytell-Amos in Dayton Daily News 8/19/49. LaMotta-Fox in The Berkshire Evening Eagle, 11/22/1947. Chasing Ezzard Charles in Times-Picayune 4/5/46. Sparring a heavyweight in San Francisco Examiner 1/19/48; Bert willing to fight Cerdan for free and Mills, AP, 12/15/48. Oakland Billy Smith in Berkeley Daily Gazette, 4/10/45, Red Smith’s “Views of Sports,” 9/15/52, AP 1/4, 5/51 and UP 1/4/51. Ezzard Charles at fight in AP 2/27/48; Moore-Lytell I, The Sun 7/14,15,16/47; Moore-Lytell II, Toledo Blade 1/29,31/50, 2/1/50, The Stars and Stripes, 2/5/1950.

Springs Toledo can be contacted at scalinatella@hotmail.com“>scalinatella@hotmail.com.

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Springs Toledo

Ramon Cardenas Channels Micky Ward and KOs Eduardo Ramirez on ProBox

Published

17 hours ago

April 24, 2024

Arne K. Lang

Ramon-Cardenas-Channels-Micky-Ward-and-KOs-Eduardo-Ramirez-on-ProBox

The Wednesday night bi-monthly series of fights on the ProBox TV platform is the best deal in boxing; the livestream is free with no strings attached! Tonight’s episode was headlined by a super bantamweight match between San Antonio’s Ramon Cardenas and Eduardo Ramirez who brought a caravan of rooters from his hometown in Guaymas, Sonora, Mexico.

Cardenas, coached by Joel Diaz, entered the contest ranked #4 by the WBA. He was expected to handle Ramirez with little difficulty, but this was a close, tactical fight through eight frames when lightning struck in the form of a left hook to the liver from Cardenas. Ramirez went down on one knee and wasn’t able to beat the count. It was as if Cardenas summoned the ghost of Micky Ward who had a penchant for terminating fights with the same punch that arrived out of the blue.

The official time was 1:37 of round nine. Cardenas improved to 25-1 with his14th win inside the distance. Ramirez, who was stopped in the opening round by Nick “Wrecking” Ball in London in his lone previous fight outside Mexico, falls to 23-3-3.

Co-Feature

In an upset, Tijuana super welterweight Damian Sosa won a split decision over previously undefeated Marques Valle, a local area fighter who was stepping up in class in his first 10-round go. Sosa was the aggressor, repeatedly backing his taller opponent into the ropes where Valle was unable to get good leverage behind his punches.

The 25-year-old Valle, managed by the influential David McWater, was the house fighter. This was his 10^th appearance in this building. He brought a 10-0 (7) record and was hoping to emulate the success of his younger brother Dominic Valle who scored a second-round stoppage of his opponent in this ring two weeks ago, improving to 9-0. But Sosa, who brought a 24-2 record, proved to be a bridge too high.

The judges had it 97-93 and 96-94 for the Tijuana invader and a disgraceful 98-92 for the house fighter.

Also

In a fight whose abrupt ending would be echoed by the main event, 34-year-old SoCal featherweight Ronny Rios, now training in Las Vegas, returned to the ring after a 22-month hiatus and scored a fifth-round stoppage over Nicolas Polanco of the Dominican Republic.

A three-punch combo climaxed by a left hook to the liver took the breath out of Polanco who slumped to his knees and was counted out. A two-time world title challenger, Rios advanced to 34-4 (17 KOs). Polanco, 34, declined to 21-6-1. The official time was 0:54 of round five.

—

The next ProBox show (Wednesday, May 8) will have an international cast with fighters from Kazakhstan, Japan, Mongolia, and the United Kingdom. In the main event, Liverpool’s Robbie Davies Jr will make his U.S. debut against the California-based Kazakh Sergey Lipinets.

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Haney-Garcia Redux with the Focus on Harvey Dock

Published

3 days ago

April 22, 2024

Arne K. Lang

Haney-Garcia-Redux-with-the-Focus-on-Harvey-Dock

Saturday’s skirmish between Ryan Garcia and WBC super lightweight champion Devin Haney was a messy affair, and yet a hugely entertaining fight fused with great drama. In the aftermath, Garcia and Haney were celebrated – the former for fooling all the experts and the latter for his gallant performance in a losing effort – but there were only brickbats for the third man in the ring, referee Harvey Dock.

Devin Haney was plainly ahead heading into the seventh frame when there was a sudden turnabout when Garcia put him on the canvas with his vaunted left hook. Moments later, Dock deducted a point from Garcia for a late punch coming out of a break. The deduction forced a temporary cease-fire that gave Haney a few precious seconds to regain his faculties. Before the round was over, Haney was on the deck twice more but these were ruled slips.

The deduction, which effectively negated the knockdown, struck many as too heavy-handed as Dock hadn’t previously issued a warning for this infraction. Moreover, many thought he could have taken a point away from Haney for excessive clinching. As for Haney’s second and third trips to the canvas in round seven, they struck this reporter – watching at home – as borderline, sufficient to give referee Dock the benefit of the doubt.

In a post-fight interview, Ryan Garcia faulted the referee for denying him the satisfaction of a TKO. “At the end of the day, Harvey Dock, I think he was tripping,” said Garcia. “He could have stopped that fight.”

Those that played the rounds proposition, placing their coin on the “under,” undoubtedly felt the same way.

The internet lit up with comments assailing Dock’s competence and/or his character. Some of the ponderings were whimsical, but they were swamped by the scurrilous screeching of dolts who find a conspiracy under every rock.

Stephen A. Smith, reputedly America’s highest-paid TV sports personality, was among those that felt a need to weigh-in: “This referee is absolutely terrible….Unreal! Horrible officiating,” tweeted Stephen A whose primary area of expertise is basketball.

Harvey Dock

Dock fought as an amateur and had one professional fight, winning a four-round decision over a fellow novice on a show at a non-gaming resort in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania. He says that as an amateur he was merely average, but he was better than that, a New Jersey and regional amateur champion in 1993 and 1994 while a student New Jersey’s Essex County Community College where he majored in journalism.

A passionate fan of Sugar Ray Leonard, he started officiating amateur fights in 1998 and six years later, at age 32, had his first documented action at the professional level, working low-level cards in New Jersey. The top boxing referees, to a far greater extent than the top judges, had long apprenticeships, having worked their way up from the boonies and Dock is no exception.

Per boxrec, Haney vs Garcia was Harvey Dock’s 364^th assignment in the pros and his forty-second world title fight. Some of those title fights were title in name only, they weren’t even main events, but, bit by bit, more lucrative offerings started coming his way.

On May 13, 2023, Dock worked his first fights in Nevada, a 4-rounder and then a 12-rounder on a card at the Cosmopolitan topped by the 140-pound title fight between Rolly Romero and Ismael Barroso. It was the first time that this reporter got to watch Dock in the flesh.

Ironically (in hindsight), the card would be remembered for the actions of a referee, in this case Tony Weeks who handled the main event. Barroso was winning the fight on all three cards when Weeks stepped in and waived it off in the ninth round after Romero cornered Barroso against the ropes and let loose a barrage of punches, none of which landed cleanly. Few “premature stoppages” were ever as garishly, nay ghoulishly, premature.

With all the brickbats raining down on Weeks, I felt a need to tamp down the noise by diverting attention away from Tony Weeks and toward Harvey Dock and took to the TSS Forum to share my thoughts. Referencing the 12-rounder, a robust junior welterweight affair between Batyr Akhmedov and Kenneth Sims Jr, I noted that Dock’s Las Vegas debut went smoothly. He glided effortlessly around the ring, making him inconspicuous, the mark of a good referee. (This post ran on May 15, two days after the fight.)

Folks at the Nevada State Athletic Commission were also paying attention. Dock was back in Las Vegas the following week to referee the lightweight title fight between Devin Haney and Vasyl Lomachenko and before the year was out, he would be tabbed to referee the biggest non-heavyweight fight of the year, the July 29 match in Las Vegas between Terence Crawford and Errol Spence Jr.

The Haney-Garcia fight wasn’t Harvey Dock’s best hour, I’ll concede that, but a closer look at his full body of work informs us that he is an outstanding referee.

—

While the Haney-Garcia bout was in progress, WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman threw everyone a curve ball, tweeting on “X” that Devin Haney would keep his title if he lost the fight. Everyone, including the TV commentators, was under the impression that the title would become vacant in the event that Haney lost.

Sulaiman cited the precedent of Corrales-Castillo II.

FYI: The Corrales-Castillo rematch, originally scheduled for June 3, 2005 and aborted on the day prior when Castillo failed to make weight, finally came off on Oct. 8 of that year, notwithstanding the fact that Castillo failed to make weight once again, scaling three-and-a-half pounds above the lightweight limit. He knocked out Corrales in the fourth round with a left hook that Las Vegas Review-Journal boxing writer Kevin Iole, alluding to the movie “Blazing Saddles,” described as Mongo-esque (translation: the punch would have knocked out a horse). After initially insisting on a rubber match, which had scant chance of happening, WBC president Jose Sulaiman, Mauricio’s late father, ruled that Corrales could keep his title.

Whether or not you agree with Mauricio Sulaiman’s rationale, the timing of his announcement was certainly awkward.

Haney’s mandatory is Spanish southpaw Sandor Martin (42-3, 15 KOs), a cutie best known for his 2021 upset of Mikey Garcia. A bout between Haney and Martin has the earmarks of a dull fight.

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In a Shocker, Ryan Garcia Confounds the Experts and Upsets Devin Haney

Published

5 days ago

April 21, 2024

David A. Avila

In-a-Shocker-Ryan-Garcia-Confounds-the-Experts-and-Upsets-Devin-Haney

Its good to be crazy. Like a fox.

Ryan “KingRy” Garcia knocked down WBC super lightweight titlist Devin Haney three times to remind everyone of his fighting abilities in winning by majority decision on Saturday.

“I just knew what I could do,” Garcia said.

Fans will not forget the lanky kid from Victorville, California now.

Garcia (25-1, 20 KOs) fooled everyone in playing crazy weeks before the fight, then showed shocking power to hand Haney (30-1, 15 KOs) his first loss as a professional at Barclays Center in Brooklyn.

Haney’s WBC super lightweight title was not at stake for Garcia because he weighed three pounds over the limit.

After Garcia seemingly acting out of control on social media, Haney’s guard must have slipped in the first round during the first few seconds as Garcia connected with that hellish left hook and Haney, with a look of shock in his eyes, almost went down. He barely survived the first round.

“He caught me with it,” said Haney.

During the next few rounds, Haney proceeded to advance toward Garcia seemingly fully aware of the lethal left hook. He used feints and rights to score with a busier approach as Garcia seemed cocked and ready to counter with a left hook.

In the fourth round it seemed Haney was confident he had regained control of the fight, but every time he opened up with more than a two-punch combination Garcia reminded him whose hands were faster and more dangerous.

Though Garcia seldom jabbed he seemed bent on looking for the right moment to unleash his deadly left hook. And every time the Southern California fighter opened up with a combination he scored and Haney dare not exchange.

A few times Haney smiled as if signifying he escaped.

In the seventh round Haney looked to punish Garcia’s body and instead was met with a three-punch combination included a left hook to the chin and down went Haney slumped on the ground. He managed to beat the count and as soon as Garcia came within reach Haney wrapped his arms around him with a python grip. Despite the warnings by referee Harvey Dock, the fallen fighter would not release and Garcia impatiently fired a weak punch during the break. The referee deducted a point from Garcia though he could have deducted a point from Haney for not obeying his instructions to release his hold. Haney actually went down three times in the round but only one was counted by the referee.

From that point on Haney was very cautious but still looking to win by decision.

Though Garcia kept using a shoulder-roll defense that left his body exposed, he would retaliate with three and four punch combinations that usually Haney could defend against other fighters.. But Garcia’s blazing combinations were too fast to defend.

In the 10^th round Haney looked to attack and was countered by Garcia’s right and a blinding left hook to the chin and another two blows that sent the former undisputed lightweight champion to the floor again.

It didn’t look good for Haney to survive.

Garcia walked into the 11^th round still composed and never out-of-control He dared Haney to exchange and when within striking distance Garcia unleashed another lightning combination and down went Haney again with a defeated look.

Both fighters had fought each other as amateurs six times so there were no surprises between them. But Garcia’s power and speed were superior and that was the difference in a professional fight.

In the final round both were cautious with Garcia’s combination punching proving too dangerous for Haney to open up. Garcia celebrated early as the round ended confident of victory.

After 12 rounds Garcia was seen the victor by majority decision 112-112, 114-110, 115-109.

“You really thought I was crazy,” Garcia told the interviewer and the crowd. “You guys hated on me.”

Other Bouts

Arnold Barboza (30-0) won a curious split decision victory over United Kingdom’s Sean McComb (18-2) in a 10-round super lightweight fight. McComb’s long reach and busy southpaw style gave Barboza trouble. But he managed to win the fight though the crowd was not pleased.

Bektemir Melikuziev (14-1, 10 KOs) defeated France’s Pierre Dibombe (22-1-1) by technical decision after eight rounds due to a cut on his eye from an accidental head butt. It was a very competitive super middleweight fight.

Costa Rica’s David Jimenez (16-1, 11 KOs) outworked John “Scrappy Ramirez (13-1, 9 KOs) in a 12-round scrap to upset the Los Angeles based fighter. After a few close rounds Jimenez simply bullied his way inside and forced Ramirez against the ropes and unloaded his guns.

After 12 rounds two judges saw it 117-111 and 116-114 all for Jimenez.

“I’m a hard-working man from Cartago I come from nothing,” said Jimenez. “My corner told me I had to work inside.”

Charles Conwell (19-0, 14 KOs) stepped on the gas early with vicious body shots and uppercuts and blasted through the resilient Nathaniel Gallimore (22-8-1, 17 KOs) for several rounds. After a brutal fifth and sixth round the referee halted the one-side beating in favor of Conwell who was fighting for the first time under the Golden Boy banner.

Another winner was Sergiy Derevyanchenko (15-5) by decision over Vaughn Alexander (18-11-1) in a super middleweight match.

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