Boxing Noir

Published

11 years ago

November 18, 2013

Adam Berlin’s “Both Members of the Club”

When the grandfathers of today’s hand-wringers were running around with their hats pulled down over their ears hollering that boxing was in its last days, W.C. Heinz published a novel.

The Professional is the story of Eddie Brown, a middleweight with dreams dashed at the end of a fist that was not his own. It is considered by many the greatest boxing novel ever written. I suppose it is. The writing is stripped-down, like a fighter at his weigh-in; hyperfocused, like a man at the end of the line. Heinz added nothing to spare anyone’s feelings, including his own. The sudden heartbreak that closes the novel was such that even he couldn’t bear to read it again.

Prize fighting, he said without saying, is the ballad of every man and being thus, it isn’t going anywhere.

Heinz was one of those boxing “experts” who would wince at the term. He slipped only once in the 334-page edition that I read. Speaking through narrator Frank Hughes, Heinz says that Ezzard Charles “wasn’t the complete fighter and that showed in his fights.” Out came the pen when I saw that. I wrote “forgot Baroudi” at the margin. Heinz’s mistake is the all-too common mistake of overstressing the 1950s version of Charles. The fact is, Charles was as complete a fighter who ever lived in the 1940s—blasting contenders and ex-champions out of their boots and whipping Charley Burley on his own turf before graduating from high school, and then whipping him again, which was unheard of. Charles’s blitzkrieg ended the moment Sam Baroudi died at his hands in 1948. The fire was gone after that and the fans and the historians forgot it ever was.

But I forgave Heinz his oversight, and not just because good Christian Ezzard would insist. I forgave him because he was gifted. “When you want to beat another man,” his narrator says to his fighter, “you try to beat him, literally.” He continues:

You don’t try to hit behind the runner, or work the pitcher for a walk or break a curve over the corner of the plate. These are the refinements of civilization …I like most of the refinements of civilization, but I have to believe that of all games—if that’s what we’re talking about—yours goes the deepest and, going deepest, goes the furthest toward the truth.

Those words were published in 1958. Today, author Adam Berlin is continuing the tradition of boxing noir. He is exploring the truth of our pre-grave existence; of what Thoreau called “quiet desperation.” Berlin finds traces of it in blinking yellow parking lots, in money changing hands, in the timeless ring. His writing, like Heinz’s, is stripped down. Unlike Heinz’s, it is not bound by the refinements of previous generations. Berlin, in other words, doesn’t blush. The truth he seeks is ruthless truth, and he does so ruthlessly. He teaches writing courses at John Jay College in Manhattan and I have a feeling his more sheltered students get wide-eyed real quick.

Both Members of the Club (Texas Review Press) was published earlier this month. It won the 2012 Clay Reynolds Novella Prize and by page five I could see why. I read it inside of a day. “Pretty soon you’ll be a body they use to build other fighters’ records,” Sam tells friend and fighter Billy Carlyle (and Ezzard Charles and every other over-the-hill-fighter that ever stumbled out of the ring):

“They’ll pay you to bleed and lose and the fans will love watching you because every time you fight your eyes will open up and start gushing and they’ll be getting their money’s worth.”
Sam’s sitting all the way forward. She catches herself, sits back in the booth.
“You done?” Billy says.
They’re looking at each other, eyes to eyes, a blinking game, one eye with stitches.
“You done?” he says again.

Wizened Heinz is in these pages, half-illuminated on 33^rd and Seventh in New York City, in the dim corridors of Madison Square Garden, in Paris in a gym in Berlin’s description of “the pull” that happens when the hooks explode and sweat flies and everything is working right. And Heinz isn’t alone. What Heinz was to the word, George Bellows was to the brushstroke. The title of Berlin’s novellais spun from Bellows’ Both Members of This Club (1909), a masterpiece of realism first exhibited, properly, in an old warehouse on West 35^th Street. The angst depicted in the painting is bigger than the ring. Berlin trains his eye on that. When Sam swears off attending any more of Billy’s fights because he’s losing —and bleeding, Berlin’s narrator reminds her that boxing is merely a reflection of their own quiet desperation without the complications. “There’s blood in everything,” he says.

Billy can touch the scar tissue over his eyes though he’s in denial about what it means. The narrator and Sam wear their scars inside and hide them from Billy, who emerges (as fighters usually do in literature) as the innocent. When he fights, Billy’s eyes spring leaks. Berlin asks the reader to look again as he paints with slashing strokes every bit as suggestive as Bellows: The friendship that the three characters had clung to since childhood—itself a mass of scar tissue—likewise springs leaks.

Bellows’ masterpiece is a translucent screen on Berlin’s literary stage. But does it bless or haunt? The figure at left looks to me like a homage to the straining loser; especially so given that his opponent is almost certainly the great Joe Gans. His face, partially obscured, is distorted with pain and red with desperation. His arms splay upwards in an effort to ward off the inevitable blows coming his way. And isn’t that, ultimately, every one of us?

Berlin has written a first-rate novella about that which puts our backs to the ropes and knocks us and our illusions down and sometimes —out. Like Billy Carlyle, the best of us will go down swinging, but we’re all headed in the same direction.

Here’s to the losers, Berlin says without saying, bless us all.

Both Members of the Club (2013) by Adam Berlin.
Fiction. $12.95. 978-1-937875-47-3.

Photograph by author.Springs Toledo can be contacted at scalinatella@hotmail.com.

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With Olympic Boxing on the Ropes, Three Elite U.S. Amateurs Shine in Colorado

Published

2 hours ago

November 5, 2024

Arne K. Lang

With-Olympic-Boxing-on-the-Ropes-Three-Elite-U.S.-Amateurs-Shine-in-Colorado

Three USA boxers won gold medals at the recently concluded World Boxing U19 tournament in Pueblo, Colorado. The tournament, restricted to boxers aged 17 and 18, attracted contestants from 30 nations and a contingent from French Polynesia.

The U.S. team, represented by eight male and six female boxers, secured 11 medals in all, an impressive haul.

The three U.S. gold medalists appear to have very bright futures if they choose to remain in the sport. They are:

Light heavyweight (80 kg) ELIJAH LUGO (Marrietta, GA)

Lugo has purportedly scored 42 stoppages in his amateur career, the most since USA Boxing began keeping track. The record was previously held by his older brother Nathan Lugo who is currently 2-0 (2 KOs) at the professional level. The Lugo brothers are represented by David McWater (Split-T Management). One of boxing’s most influential facilitators, McWater’s clients include Teofino Lopez.

Middleweight (75 kg) JOSEPH AWININGYA JR (Joliet, IL)

The son of a Ghanaian immigrant who had a brief career as a professional boxer, competing as a cruiserweight, the precocious Awiningya, mature for his age, is a college student majoring in marketing who once aspired to become a nurse like his mother.

Flyweight (50 kg) LORENZO PATRICIO (Waianae, Hawai)

One of eight children. Patricio (our poster boy for this story) comes from a boxing family. Two of his sisters are involved in the sport.

—

In addition to the three gold medalists, the U.S. men’s team garnered two silver and three bronze. The U.S. women managed only three bronze, somewhat of a disappointment. Lightweight Shamiracle Hardaway (Lagrange, GA), considered one of the favorites, fell to England’s Ella Lonsdale in the semifinals. Ms. Lonsdale has a wonderful surname for a British boxer.

—

The best showing was by fast-rising India which had 17 medal winners including three golds. Although boxer Mery Kom (aka Mary Kom) is one of the most popular sports personalities in India, the South Asian nation, the world’s most populous country, has never had a large presence in boxing, amateur or pro. Ten of the 17 Indian medalists, including two of three gold medal winners, were female.

—

Tournament organizers noted that the Pueblo event was the first major tournament in the next Olympic cycle. Left unsaid was that boxing as an Olympic sport is on the ropes (pardon the pun). As it now stands, boxing, one of the original Olympic sports, is not on the docket for the 2028 Summer Games in Los Angeles.

The International Olympic Committee de-frocked the International Boxing Association, the governing body of amateur boxing, in 2023. The decision was upheld in April by the Court of Arbitration for Sport, an agency headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland.

A new body, World Boxing, emerged from the fallout. The Pueblo tournament bore the imprint of the new organization.

The chairman of World Boxing’s “Olympic Commission” is Gennadiy Golovkin who is also the president of Kazakhstan’s National Olympic Committee. A former Olympic silver medalist whose primary residence is in the Los Angeles area, “GGG” is reportedly fluent in four languages. He is tasked with repairing the rent between boxing and the International Olympic Committee so that boxing can continue to be an Olympic sport. A decision is expected next year.

If successful, it is possible that things may revert to the days when professional boxers were ineligible to compete for Olympic medals.

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Floyd Schofield Wins a Banger and Gabriela Fundora Wins by KO

Published

3 days ago

November 3, 2024

David A. Avila

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Floyd Schofield Wins a Banger and Gabriela Fundora Wins by KO

LAS VEGAS-Shades of Henry Armstrong and Baby Arizmendi. If you don’t know those names, look them up.

Floyd Schofield battled his way past Mexico’s super tough Rene Tellez Giron who walked through every blow the Texan could fire but lost by decision on Saturday.

It was a severe test and perfect matchmaking for Schofield who yearns for the big bouts against the lightweight giants roaming the world.

Schofield (18-0, 12 KOs) remains undefeated and won the war over thick-necked Mexican Tellez Giron (20-4, 13 KOs) who has never been knocked out and proved to be immune to big punches.

In the opening rounds, the Texas fighter came out firing rapid combinations from the southpaw and orthodox stances. Meanwhile the shorter Tellez Giron studied and fired back an occasional counter for two rounds.

Tellez Giron had seen enough and took his stand in the third stanza. Both unleashed blazing bombs with Schofield turning his back to the Mexican. At that moment referee Tom Taylor could have waved the fight over.

You never turn your back.

The fight resumed and Schofield was damaged. He tried to open up with even more deadly fire but was rebuked by the strong chin of Tellez Giron who fired back in the mad frenzy.

For the remainder of the fight Schofield tried every trick in his arsenal to inflict damage on the thick-necked Mexican. He could not be wobbled. In the 11^th round both opened up with serious swing-from-the-heels combinations and suddenly Schofield was looking up. He beat the count easily and the two remained slugging it out.

“He hit me with a good shot,” Schofield said of the knockdown. “I just had to get up. I’m not going to quit.”

In the final round Schofield moved around looking for the proper moment to engage. The Mexican looked like a cat ready to pounce and the two fired furious blows. Neither was hit with the big bombs in the last seconds.

There was Tellez Giron standing defiantly like Baby Arizmendi must have stood in those five ferocious meetings against the incomparable Henry Armstrong. Three of their wars took place in Los Angeles, two at the Olympic Auditorium in the late 1930s as the U.S. was emerging from the Great Depression.

In this fight, Schofield took the win by unanimous decision by scores 118-109 twice and 116-111. It was well-deserved.

“I tried to bang it out,” said Schofield. “Today I learned you can’t always get the knockout.”

Fundora

IBF flyweight titlist Gabriela Fundora needed seven rounds to figure out the darting style of Argentina’s Gabriela Alaniz before firing a laser left cross down the middle to end the battle and become the undisputed flyweight world champion.

Fundora now holds all four titles including the WBO, WBA and WBC titles that Alaniz brought in the ring.

Fundora knocked down Alaniz midway through the seventh round. She complained it was due to a tangle of the legs. Several seconds later Fundora blasted the Argentine to the floor again with a single left blast. This time there was no doubt. Her corner wisely waved a white towel to stop the fight at 1:40 of the seventh round.

No one argued the stoppage.

Other Bouts

Bektemir Melikuziev (15-1, 10 KOs) didn’t make weight in a title bout but managed to out-fight David Stevens (14-2, 10 KOs) in a super middleweight fight held at 12 rounds.

Melikuziev used his movement and southpaw stance to keep Pennsylvania’s Stevens from being able to connect with combinations. But Stevens did show he could handle “The Bully’s” punching power over the 12-round fight.

After 12 rounds one judge favored Stevens 116-112, while two others saw Melikuziev the winner by split decision 118-110 and 117-111.

Super middleweight WBA titlist Darius Fulghum (13-0, 11 KOs) pummeled his way to a technical knockout win over southpaw veteran Chris Pearson (17-5-1, 12 KOs) who attempted the rope-a-dope strategy to no avail.

Fulghum floored Pearson in the first round with a four-punch combination and after that just belted Pearson who covered up and fired an occasional blow. Referee Mike Perez stopped the fight at 1:02 of the third round when Pearson did not fire back after a blazing combination.

Young welterweight prospect Joel Iriarte (5-0, 5 KOs) blasted away at the three-inch shorter Xavier Madrid (5-6, 2 KOs) who hung tough for as long as possible. At 2:50 of the first round a one-two delivered Madrid to the floor and referee Thomas Taylor called off the beating.

Iriarte, from Bakersfield, Calif., could not miss with left uppercuts and short rights as New Mexico’s Madrid absorbed every blow but would not quit. It was just too much firepower from Iriarte that forced the stoppage.

Photos credit: Cris Esqueda / Golden Boy

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Results and Recaps from Turning Stone where O’Shaquie Foster Nipped Robson Conceicao

Published

3 days ago

November 2, 2024

Arne K. Lang

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Top Rank was at the Turning Stone casino-resort in Verona, New York, tonight with an 8-bout card topped by a rematch between Robson Conceicao and O’Shaquie Foster with the victor retaining or recapturing his IBF world junior lightweight title. When the smoke cleared, the operative word was “recapturing” as Foster became a two-time title-holder, avenging his controversial setback to the Brazilian in Newark on July 6.

This was a somewhat better fight than their initial encounter and once again the verdict was split. Foster prevailed by 115-113 on two of the cards with the dissenting judge favoring Conceicao by the same margin. Conceicao seemingly had the edge after nine frames, but Foster, a 4/1 favorite, landed the harder shots in the championship rounds.

It was the thirteenth victory in the last 14 starts for Foster who fights out of Houston. A two-time Olympian and 2016 gold medalist, the 36-year-old Conceicao is 19-3-1 overall and 1-3-1 in world title fights.

Semi-wind-up

SoCal lightweight Raymond Muratalla (22-0, 17 KOs) made a big jump in public esteem and moved one step closer to a world title fight with a second-round blast-out of Jose Antonio Perez who was on the canvas twice but on his feet when the fight was stopped at the 1:24 mark of round two. Muratalla, a product of Robert Garcia’s boxing academy, is ranked #2 by the WBC and WBO. A Tijuana native, Perez (25-6) earned this assignment with an upset of former Olympian and former 130-pound world titlist Jojo Diaz,

Other Bouts

Syracuse junior welterweight Bryce Mills, a high-pressure fighter with a strong local following, stopped scrawny Mike O’Han Jr whose trainer Mark DeLuca pulled him out after five one-sided rounds. Mills improved to 17-1 (6 KOs). It was another rough day at the office for Massachusetts house painting contractor O’’Han (19-4) who had the misfortune of meeting Abdullah Mason in his previous bout.

In a junior lightweight fight that didn’t heat up until late in the final round, Albany’s Abraham Nova (23-3-1) and Tijuana native Humberto Galindo (14-3-3) fought to a 10-round draw. It was another close-but-no- cigar for the likeable Nova who at least stemmed a two-fight losing streak. The judges had it 97-93 (Galindo), 96-94 (Nova) and 95-95.

Twenty-one-year-old Long Island middleweight Jahi Tucker advanced to 13-1-1 (6 KOs) with an eighth-round stoppage of Stockton’s teak-tough but outclassed Quilisto Madera (14-6). Madera was on a short leash after five rounds, but almost took it to the final bell with the referee intervening with barely a minute remaining in the contest. Madera was on his feet when the match was halted. Earlier in the round, Tucker had a point deducted for hitting on the break.

Danbury, Connecticut heavyweight Ali Feliz, one of two fighting sons of journeyman heavyweight Fernely Feliz, improved to 4-0 (3) with a second-round stoppage of beefy Rashad Coulter (5-5). Feliz had Coulter pinned against the ropes and was flailing away when the bout was halted at the 1:34 mark. The 42-year-old Coulter, a competitor in all manner of combat sports, hadn’t previously been stopped when competing as a boxer.

Featherweight Yan Santana dominated and stopped Mexico’s Eduardo Baez who was rescued by referee Charlie Fitch at the 1:57 mark of round four. It was the 12^th knockout in 13 starts for Santana, a 24-year-old Dominican father of three A former world title challenger, Mexicali’s Baez declines to 23-7-2 but has lost six of his last eight.

In his most impressive showing to date, Damian Knyba, a six-foot-seven Pole, knocked out paunchy Richard Lartey at the 2:10 mark of round three. A right-left combination knocked Lartey into dreamland, but it was the right did the damage and this was of the nature of a one-punch knockout. Referee Ricky Gonzalez waived the fight off without starting a count.

Knyba, 28, improved to 14-0 (8 KOs). A native of Ghana coming off his career-best win, a fourth-round stoppage of Polish veteran Andrzej Wawrzyk, Lartey declined to 16-7 with his sixth loss inside the distance.

Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank

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