The Tragedy of “The Harlem Hammer” Needn’t Be Repeated So Often

Published

10 years ago

November 21, 2014

His nickname, ironically, was “The Harlem Hammer.”

James Butler was a super middleweight boxer, and a pretty good one at that. A fan favorite in his native New York City because of his relentless, attacking style, Butler was accomplished enough to have earned a title shot at IBF super middleweight champion Sven Ottke on Sept. 1, 2000, in Magdeburg, Germany, and despite the fact that he dropped a one-sided decision to the slick-boxing German, he was still rated at No. 8 in the 168-pound weight class by the IBF when he took on Richard Grant in his next bout, on Nov. 23 of that year, at the Roseland Ballroom in midtown Manhattan.

Grant, a pronounced underdog despite the fact he had outpointed Butler in a four-rounder early in the respective careers, on Jan. 31, 1997, had reprised his earlier victory in winning a unanimous, 10-round decision. The Brooklyn, N.Y., resident was celebrating with his cornermen when Grant, whose gloves had been removed, walked over as if to offer a congratulatory handshake.

As Grant lifted his arms to hug his opponent, a gesture of respect and sportsmanship that is so often the case in even the hardest-fought boxing matches, “The Harlem Hammer” nailed him with an overhand right to the jaw that sent the victor crashing to the canvas, unconscious, bloody spittle spewing from his mouth like fiery ash from an erupting volcano.

That’s when all hell broke loose. But it would not be the last criminally violent act of a mentally unstable individual whose inner demons had yet to become fully, and tragically, apparent.

Predictably, Bob Papa and Teddy Atlas, who had called the bout that was televised on ESPN2, reacted with shock and revulsion.

“James Butler should never be allowed in the ring again!” Papa, the blow-by-blow announcer, screamed into his microphone. “Absolutely! That’s assault and battery! He should be arrested right on the spot! What a punk! The police should come in here and arrest him! Handcuff him!”

Atlas, the color analyst, was no less aghast by what he had just seen. “Butler just went over there and sucker-punched – sucker-punched! – and knocked out Grant,” he said. “Oh, boy. Terrible. And the new commissioner (of the New York State Athletic Commission), Ray Kelly, will do something very, very enforceful here … That was a punch without a glove on! A despicable, cowardly act!”

Butler’s in-ring meltdown is all the more egregious and unfathomable considering the circumstances: All the proceeds from the “Fighting for America” card, held just two months after the 9/11 terrorist attacks that had left 3,000 dead and a nation shaken, went to the Twin Towers Fund, and about 500 New York police officers and firefighters were among the 1,517 spectators. Several of the participating boxers – including Butler, who was to be paid $10,000 – had pledged their entire purses toward the relief effort.

Seated at ringside was Kelly, who in addition to his top spot with the NYSAC, was New York mayor-elect Michael Bloomberg’s newly appointed police commissioner. If Butler was going to commit an act of senseless violence that potentially could have landed him in prison for seven years, this was the worst possible audience before which to do it.

Kelly, in fact, did order the arrest of Butler, who was led from the arena in handcuffs. He spent the night at the Rikers Island detention facility, and he later was convicted of assault. He served four months behind bars, accelerating a personal and professional decline that may have been inevitable in any case.

Born and raised in a housing project by a mother who frequently left him and his brother to fend for themselves, Butler had gotten a reputation for having a quick temper even before he coldcocked Grant and made himself something of a pariah in New York’s close-knit boxing community. Tales abounded of harsh words, and sometimes blows, he frequently exchanged with sparring partners and others outside the ring at the gym that served as his home base as well as for Atlas, who trained fighters in addition to his ESPN2 analyst duties.

“I’m sure there were previous incidents (prior to the postfight knockout of Grant) if you trace it back,” Atlas told me a few days before the Nov. 23 anniversary date of the fateful night he now calls “probably the worst” transgression he has ever seen in the sport, along with Mike Tyson’s chewing off of part of Evander Holyfield’s right ear on June 28, 1997. “I’m sure there were other past acts of violence, or at least threats of violence. I knew he had gotten into some skirmishes in the gym where I was when he was training, but they never got to a level where he seriously hurt anybody. Some threats may have been made, but you see that sometimes in the gym. Usually nothing comes of it.”

Perhaps, if he had refrained from throwing the illegal punch that sent his career spinning wildly off-kilter, things would have turned out much differently for Butler. Then again, maybe not. He ballooned to 256 pounds, in part because of medication he was put on after he was diagnosed as being bipolar, but, even after he put in the time to get all the unwanted weight off – a process expedited by the fact he had cut back on or stopped taking his meds — he was a mere shadow of the fighter he had been. He was just 2-2 against mostly second-tier opponents after the Grant debacle, his final ring appearance a split-decision loss to Omar Sheika on Aug. 10, 2004.

Personal issues also contributed to Butler’s deteriorating state of mind and overall demise. He relocated to Vero Beach, Fla., to work with his new trainer, Buddy McGirt, and while there he met a woman, Chase Mariposa, who was to bear him a son. Mariposa would later say that Butler, his boxing income all but gone and his reputation in tatters, would often erupt into frightening fits of anger.

Feeling alone and unwanted, Butler, a two-time New York Golden Gloves champion, turned to the one friend who had been there for him through thick and frequently thin – Sam Kellerman, younger brother of Max Kellerman, a sports talk-show host who is now a boxing analyst for HBO Sports.

Sam Kellerman – well-educated (a graduate of Columbia University), outgoing, from an affluent family — seemed an unlikely candidate to ever have formed an alliance with the brooding Butler, a product of some of New York’s meaner streets. They were both products of the same town, but from decidedly different sections, and decidedly different sociological strata. Kellerman, a white-collar type who boxed to, as one associate said, “to toughen himself up,” and Butler, the menacing pro, had been introduced to each other a decade earlier by their mutual trainer, Alexander Newbold, who believed it was beneficial for his fighters to socialize outside of the gym.

Kellerman, by then living in Hollywood, Calif., agreed to take Butler in, with the understanding he would be a houseguest for only a few days. But the days stretched into weeks, Butler revealing no intention to move out, at which point Kellerman told his now-not-so-close friend that he would have him evicted if he did not leave voluntarily.

On Oct. 17, 2004, Sam Kellerman, 29, was found dead on the floor of his blood-splattered apartment. His body had been there for several days, the authorities said, and there was evidence of arson. The murder weapon, a bloody hammer, was found at the scene.

Three days after Kellerman’s body was discovered, Butler turned himself in to the police. He pleaded not guilty to murder and arson, but later pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and arson and was sentenced to 29 years, four months in prison by Superior Court Judge Michael Pastor.

Violent behavior, sometimes resulting in death, is common enough that it scarcely raises an eyebrow in 21^st century America. But when sports celebrities are involved, the issue takes on heightened significance. Even non-NFL fans are aware of the domestic- violence scandals that have made such well-known football players as Ray Rice, Adrian Peterson and Ray McDonald notorious figures. All of which raises an issue that increasingly merits discussion: Are athletes, especially those who have risen to prominence from desperately poor or disadvantaged backgrounds, more susceptible to involvement in the kind of incidents that have become something of a national cause celebre?

Atlas believes each case should be judged on its individual merits, but what are the criteria for realizing, with any degree of certainty, that anyone is a ticking time bomb about to go off?

“I think it’s important at all levels of society to identify someone who might have tendencies that are not conducive to a proper workplace,” said Atlas, whose concedes that his own background is pockmarked with youthful indiscretions. “If someone’s actions suggest he has violent impulses, that should not be accepted any place. It shouldn’t just be relegated to sports. We have to look at these things seriously at all times, but maybe even more so nowadays, because there seems to be more and more incidents that we’re learning about.

“It could be a stepfather beating a two-year-old child to death, which just happened in the Bronx and I read about in the newspaper. Apparently this child had shown signs of being abused by this person before, and was put back in that household. Now she’s dead. If she hadn’t been put back in that household, she’d still be alive. This is a child who never had a real chance at life.

“Do we need to look at things like that, and the James Butler situation, closer? Who’s responsibility is that? Who’s actually qualified to say this or that person is dangerous? I also read that somebody pushed somebody else in front of a subway train. They’ll probably find that the guy who did it is mentally disturbed, and I’m sure there are people capable of such things walking around the streets of New York right now. But who gets to make this call that `This person needs help,’ or `This other person should be put away.’ Usually it doesn’t happen until he acts out.”

So we are left to wonder, who is the next James Butler? Or the next Ike Ibeabuchi? Is one act of aberrant behavior enough to send up a red warning flare? Is two sufficient? Three or more?

Upon his return to boxing after his vicious attack on Grant, Butler his thought process went so blank he didn’t even realize what he had done, or why he had done it.

“Nothing went through my mind,” Butler told Tim Smith, of the New York Daily News, before his first post-Grant bout, against Thomas Reid, on Feb. 27, 2005. “That’s the point. It was flat-line. I was like dead. I went blank. After I hit Richard everything clicked back on. It was like fist to jaw, then the noise and the lights and I could see and hear all the people. It was like I was literally brain-dead for a while. If I had been thinking I would have just walked out of the ring, maybe punched a locker or broken a door or something.”

Understandably, Max Kellerman was – and still is – shaken by the death of a brother he cherished. But even he was prepared to grant Butler a bit of leniency just days after his post-fight assault on Grant. In a bylined story for ESPN.com, Max noted that “Riddick Bowe punched Larry Donald with his bare fist at a press conference promoting their match in 1994. The blow did no real physical damage. Nonetheless, it was assault. Bowe was neither led away in handcuffs nor handed a lifetime suspension from any state athletic commission. It could be that the handling of Bowe’s assault was a mistake, and a more severe reaction was warranted. Yet if an example is made of Butler, the Bowe incident will beg the question: was Butler punished out of proportion?

“Mike Tyson bit a part of Evander Holyfield’s ear off, knocked Orlin Norris down and ended the fight after the bell had run to end the first round of their bout, admittedly tried to break Frans Botha’s arm in a clinch, and hit and knocked down the referee who tried to stop his fight against Lou Savarese. Tyson’s license has not been permanently taken away, despite this pattern of bad behavior. James Butler has no such pattern. His attacking Grant was an isolated incident.”

Atlas is correct. Good or bad, right or wrong, are not reserved sections for any particular group. The Menendez brothers, Lyle and Erik, were convicted in 1994 for the shotgun murder of their affluent parents in the family’s Beverly Hills, Calif., mansion. A movie that is drawing Academy Award notices, “Foxcatcher,” is in theaters now and details the murder of Olympic wrestler Dave Schultz by John Eleuthere du Pont, the heir to the du Pont pharmaceutical fortune. Du Pont, who was convicted in 1997, had demonstrated increasingly erratic and paranoid behavior prior to his killing of Schultz, but it was largely shrugged off as the eccentricities of a very wealthy man.

Atlas could offer himself as proof that everyone at least deserves a second chance. Son of a beloved physician in the family’s Staten Island, N.Y., neighborhood, the young Teddy dropped out of high school, served time in Rikers Island for his participation in an armed robbery and still bears the jagged facial scar from a street slashing that required 400 stitches to close. On Nov. 20, a date in close calendar proximity to the anniversary date of Butler’s unprovoked slugging of Grant, he will host the 18^th annual Dr. Theodore A. Atlas Foundation dinner, which aids Staten Island’s poor, sick and forgotten with emergency funds, as needed. And, on Saturday, Nov. 21, he again will distribute a thousand turkeys so that some of for the borough’s underprivileged citizens will have something to be thankful for on Thanksgiving.

Perhaps there is no way of absolutely detecting when a James Butler will cross the line separating civility and depravity, but there are enough instances when a Teddy Atlas or a Bernard Hopkins brakes himself before passing the point of no return that everyone else can dare to hope that salvation exists on a wider basis.

The final page of Teddy’s autobiography, “Atlas: A Son’s Journey From the Streets to the Ring to a Life Worth Living,” co-authored with Peter Alson, offers this positive message.

“I’m very aware of the extremes within me,” Atlas writes. “The caring and the anger. I’ve gotten better over the years at modulating them and controlling them, but I won’t pretend they don’t still exist. I guess in some ways my whole life has been a journey and a search for family. I wasn’t some kid from the streets. I was a doctor’s don who grew up in a nice house in a good neighborhood. It just goes to show that you can be lost and alone and neglected in any kind of surroundings.”

It’s too bad for Sam Kellerman – for all of us, really – that the journey of James Butler, “The Harlem Hammer,” didn’t lead him to the same sort of favorable destination.

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Bernard Fernandez

Avila Perspective, Chap. 326: A Hectic Boxing Week in L.A.

Published

8 hours ago

May 16, 2025

David A. Avila

Avila-Perspective-Chap-326-A-Hectic-Boxing-Week-in-LA

The Los Angeles area is packed with boxing.

Japan’s Mizuki “Mimi” Hiruta, Ukraine’s Serhii Bohachuk, and the indefatigable Jake Paul are all in the Los Angeles area this week.

First, Hiruta (7-0, 2 KOs) defends the WBO super flyweight title against Argentina’s Carla Merino on Saturday May 17, at Commerce Casino. The 360 Boxing Promotions card will be streamed on UFC Fight Pass.

Voted Japan’s best female fighter, Hiruta faces a stiff challenge from Merino who traveled thousands of miles from Cordoba.

360 Promotions is one of the top promotions especially when it comes to presenting female prizefighting. Two of their other female fighters, Lupe Medina and Jocelyn Camarillo, will also be fighting on Saturday.

They are not only promoting female fighters. They have several top male champions including Bohachuk and Omar “Trinidad performing this Saturday.

Don’t miss this show at Commerce Casino.

“This card is one of the deepest cards we’ve promoted in Southern California which has been proven by the rush for tickets and the wealth of media interest. Serhii, Omar and Mizuki are three of the top fighters in their respective weight classes and it’s a great opportunity for fans to see a full night of action,” said Tom Loeffler of 360 Promotions.

Jake and Chavez Jr. in L.A.

Jake Paul took time off from training in Puerto Rico to visit Los Angeles to hype his upcoming fight against former world champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. next month.

“The fans have wanted to see this, and I want to continue to elevate and raise the level of my opponents,” said Paul, 28. “This is a former world champion, and he has an amazing resume following in his dad’s footsteps.”

Paul, who co-owns Most Valuable Promotions with Nakisa Bidarian, last staged a wildly successful boxing card that included Amanda Serrano versus Katie Taylor and of course his own fight with Mike Tyson.

It set records for viewing according to Netflix with an estimated 108 million views.

Paul (11-1, 7 KOs) is set to face Chavez (54-6-1, 34 KOs) in a cruiserweight battle at the Honda Center in Anaheim, Calif. on June 28. DAZN pay-per-view will stream the Golden Boy Promotions and MVP fight card that includes the return of Holly Holm to the boxing world after years in MMA.

No one should underestimate Paul who does have crackling power in his fists. He is for real and at 28, is in the prime of his boxing career.

Yes, he is a social influencer who got into boxing with no amateur background, but since he engaged fully into the sport, Paul has shown remarkable improvement in all areas.

Is he perfect? Of course not.

But power is the one attribute that can neutralize any faults and Paul does have real power. I witnessed it when I first saw him in the prize ring in Los Angeles many years ago.

Chavez, 39, the son of Mexico’s great Julio Cesar Chavez, is not as good as his father but was talented enough to win a world title and hold it until 2012 when he was edged by Sergio Martinez.

The son of Chavez last fought this past July when he defeated former UFC fighter Uriah Hall in a boxing match held in Florida. He has been seeking a match with Paul for years and finally he got it.

“I need to prepare 100%. This is an interesting fight. It might not be easy, but I’m going to do the best I can to be the best person I am, but I think I’m going to take him,” said Chavez.

Paul was not shy about Chavez’s talent.

“This is his toughest fight to date, and I’m going to embarrass him and make him quit like he always does,” said Paul about Chavez Jr. “I’m going to expose and embarrass him. He’s the embarrassment of Mexico. Mexico doesn’t even claim him, and he’s going to get exposed on June 28.”

Also on the same fight card is unified cruiserweight champion Gilberto “Zurdo” Ramirez (47-1, 30 KOs) who defends the WBA and WBO titles against Yuniel Dorticos (27-2, 25 KOs).

In a surprising addition, former boxing champion Holm returns to the boxing ring after 12 years away from the sport. Can she still fight?

Holm (33-2-3, 9 KOs) meets Mexico’s Yolanda Vega (10-0, 1 KO) in a lightweight fight scheduled for 10 rounds. Holm is 43 and Vega is 29. Many eyes will be looking to see the return of Holm who was recently voted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

Wild Card Honored by L.A. City

A formal presentation by the Los Angeles City Council to honor the 30^th anniversary of the Wild Card Boxing Club takes place on Sunday May 18, at 1:30 p.m. The ceremony takes place in front of the Wild Card located at 1123 Vine Street, Hollywood 90038.

Along with city councilmembers will be a number of the top first responder officials.

Championing Mental Health

A star-studded broadcast team comprised of Al Bernstein, Corey Erdman and Lupe Contreras will announce the boxing event called “Championing Mental Health” card on Thursday May 22, at the Avalon Theater. DAZN will stream the Bash Boxing card live.

Among those fighting are Vic Pasillas, Jessie Mandapat and Ricardo Ruvalcaba.

For more information including tickets go to www.555media.com/tickets.

Fights to Watch

Sat. UFC Fight Pass 7 p.m. Mizuki Hiruta (7-0) vs Carla Merina (16-2).

Thurs. DAZN 7 p.m. Vic Pasillas (17-1) vs Carlos Jackson (20-2).

Mimi Hiruta / Tom Loeffler photo credit: Al Applerose

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Sam Goodman and Eccentric Harry Garside Score Wins on a Wednesday Card in Sydney

Published

2 days ago

May 14, 2025

Arne K. Lang

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Australian junior featherweight Sam Goodman, ranked #1 by the IBF and #2 by the WBO, returned to the ring today in Sydney, NSW, and advanced his record to 20-0 (8) with a unanimous 10-round decision over Mexican import Cesar Vaca (19-2). This was Goodman’s first fight since July of last year. In the interim, he twice lost out on lucrative dates with Japanese superstar Naoya Inoue. Both fell out because of cuts that Goodman suffered in sparring.

Goodman was cut again today and in two places – below his left eye in the eighth and above his right eye in the ninth, the latter the result of an accidental head butt – but by then he had the bout firmly in control, albeit the match wasn’t quite as one-sided as the scores (100-90, 99-91, 99-92) suggested. Vaca, from Guadalajara, was making his first start outside his native country.

Goodman, whose signature win was a split decision over the previously undefeated American fighter Ra’eese Aleem, is handled by the Rose brothers — George, Trent, and Matt — who also handle the Tszyu brothers, Tim and Nikita, and two-time Olympian (and 2021 bronze medalist) Harry Garside who appeared in the semi-wind-up.

Harry Garside

A junior welterweight from a suburb of Melbourne, Garside, 27, is an interesting character. A plumber by trade who has studied ballet, he occasionally shows up at formal gatherings wearing a dress.

Garside improved to 4-0 (3 KOs) as a pro when the referee stopped his contest with countryman Charlie Bell after five frames, deciding that Bell had taken enough punishment. It was a controversial call although Garside — who fought the last four rounds with a cut over his left eye from a clash of heads in the opening frame – was comfortably ahead on the cards.

Heavyweights

In a slobberknocker being hailed as a shoo-in for the Australian domestic Fight of the Year, 34-year-old bruisers Stevan Ivic and Toese Vousiutu took turns battering each other for 10 brutal rounds. It was a miracle that both were still standing at the final bell. A Brisbane firefighter recognized as the heavyweight champion of Australia, Ivic (7-0-1, 2 KOs) prevailed on scores of 96-94 and 96-93 twice. Melbourne’s Vousiuto falls to 8-2.

Tim Tsyzu.

The oddsmakers have installed Tim Tszyu a small favorite (minus-135ish) to avenge his loss to Sebastian Fundora when they tangle on Sunday, July 20, at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.

Their first meeting took place in this same ring on March 30 of last year. Fundora, subbing for Keith Thurman, saddled Tszyu with his first defeat, taking away the Aussie’s WBO 154-pound world title while adding the vacant WBC belt to his dossier. The verdict was split but fair. Tszyu fought the last 11 rounds with a deep cut on his hairline that bled profusely, the result of an errant elbow.

Since that encounter, Tszyu was demolished in three rounds by Bakhram Murtazaliev in Orlando and rebounded with a fourth-round stoppage of Joey Spencer in Newcastle, NSW. Fundora has been to post one time, successfully defending his belts with a dominant fourth-round stoppage of Chordale Booker.

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Thomas Hauser’s Literary Notes: Johnny Greaves Tells a Sad Tale

Published

5 days ago

May 11, 2025

Thomas Hauser

Johnny Greaves was a professional loser. He had one hundred professional fights between 2007 and 2013, lost 96 of them, scored one knockout, and was stopped short of the distance twelve times. There was no subtlety in how his role was explained to him: “Look, Johnny; professional boxing works two ways. You’re either a ticket-seller and make money for the promoter, in which case you get to win fights. If you don’t sell tickets but can look after yourself a bit, you become an opponent and you fight to lose.”

By losing, he could make upwards of one thousand pounds for a night‘s work.

Greaves grew up with an alcoholic father who beat his children and wife. Johnny learned how to survive the beatings, which is what his career as a fighter would become. He was a scared, angry, often violent child who was expelled from school and found solace in alcohol and drugs.

The fighters Greaves lost to in the pros ran the gamut from inept local favorites to future champions Liam Walsh, Anthony Crolla, Lee Selby, Gavin Rees, and Jack Catterall. Alcohol and drugs remained constants in his life. He fought after drinking, smoking weed, and snorting cocaine on the night before – and sometimes on the day of – a fight. On multiple occasions, he came close to committing suicide. His goal in boxing ultimately became to have one hundred professional fights.

On rare occasions, two professional losers – “journeymen,” they’re called in The UK – are matched against each other. That was how Greaves got three of the four wins on his ledger. On September 29, 2013, he fought the one hundredth and final fight of his career against Dan Carr in London’s famed York Hall. Carr had a 2-42-2 ring record and would finish his career with three wins in ninety outings. Greaves-Carr was a fight that Johnny could win. He emerged triumphant on a four-round decision.

The Johnny Greaves Story, told by Greaves with the help of Adam Darke (Pitch Publishing) tells the whole sordid tale. Some of Greaves’s thoughts follow:

* “We all knew why we were there, and it wasn’t to win. The home fighters were the guys who had sold all the tickets and were deemed to have some talent. We were the scum. We knew our role. Give some young prospect a bit of a workout, keep out of the way of any big shots, lose on points but take home a wedge of cash, and fight again next week.”

* “If you fought too hard and won, then you wouldn’t get booked for any more shows. If you swung for the trees and got cut or knocked out, then you couldn’t fight for another 28 days. So what were you supposed to do? The answer was to LOOK like you were trying to win but be clever in the process. Slip and move, feint, throw little shots that were rangefinders, hold on, waste time. There was an art to this game, and I was quickly learning what a cynical business it was.”

* “The unknown for the journeyman was always how good your opponent might be. He could be a future world champion. Or he might be some hyped-up nightclub bouncer with a big following who was making lots of money for the promoter.”

* “No matter how well I fought, I wasn’t going to be getting any decisions. These fights weren’t scored fairly. The referees and judges understood who the paymasters were and they played the game. What was the point of having a go and being the best version of you if nobody was going to recognize or reward it?”

* “When I first stepped into the professional arena, I believed I was tough. believed that nobody could stop me. But fight by fight, those ideas were being challenged and broken down. Once you know that you can be hurt, dropped and knocked out, you’re never quite the same fighter.”

* “I had started off with a dream, an idea of what boxing was and what it would do for me. It was going to be a place where I could prove my toughness. A place that I could escape to and be someone else for a while. For a while, boxing was that place. But it wore me down to the point that I stopped caring. I’d grown sick and tired of it all. I wished that I could feel pride at what I’d achieved. But most of the time, I just felt like a loser.”

* “The fights were getting much more difficult, the damage to my body and my psyche taking longer and longer to repair after each defeat. I was putting myself in more and more danger with each passing fight. I was getting hurt more often and stopped more regularly. Even with the 28-day [suspensions], I didn’t have time to heal. I was staggering from one fight to the next and picking up more injuries along the way.”

* “I was losing my toughness and resilience. When that’s all you’ve ever had, it’s a hard thing to accept. Drink and drugs had always been present in my life. But now they became a regular part of my pre-fight preparation. It helped to shut out the fear and quieted the thoughts and worries that I shouldn’t be doing this anymore.”

* “My body was broken. My hands were constantly sore with blisters and cuts. I had early arthritis in my hip and my teeth were a mess. I looked an absolute state and inside I felt worse. But I couldn’t stop fighting yet. Not before the 100.”

* “I had abused myself time after time and stood in front of better men, taking a beating when I could have been sensible and covered up. At the start, I was rarely dropped or stopped. Now it was becoming a regular part of the game. Most of the guys I was facing were a lot better than me. This was mainly about survival.”

* “Was my brain f***ed from taking too many punches? I knew it was, to be honest. I could feel my speech changing and memory going. I was mentally unwell and shouldn’t have been fighting but the promoters didn’t care. Johnny Greaves was still a good booking. Maybe an even better one now that he might get knocked out.”

* “Nobody gave a f*** about me and whether I lived or died. I didn’t care about that much either. But the thought of being humiliated, knocked out in front of all those people; that was worse than the thought of dying. The idea of being exposed for what I was – a nobody.”

* “I was a miserable bastard in real life. A depressive downbeat mouthy little f***er. Everything I’ve done has been to mask the feeling that I’m worthless. That I have no value. The drinks and the drugs just helped me to forget that for a while. I still frighten myself a lot. My thoughts scare me. Do I really want to be here for the next thirty or forty years? I don’t know. If suicide wasn’t so impactful on people around you, I would have taken that leap. I don’t enjoy life and never have.”

So . . . Any questions?

****

Steve Albert was Showtime’s blow-by-blow commentator for two decades. But his reach extended far beyond boxing.

Albert’s sojourn through professional sports began in high school when he was a ball boy for the New York Knicks. Over the years, he was behind the microphone for more than a dozen teams in eleven leagues including four NBA franchises.

Putting the length of that trajectory in perspective . . . As a ballboy, Steve handed bottles of water and towels to a Knicks back-up forward named Phil Jackson. Later, they worked together as commentators for the New Jersey Nets. Then Steve provided the soundtrack for some of Jackson’s triumphs when he won eleven NBA championships as head coach of the Chicago Bulls and Los Angeles Lakers.

It’s also a matter of record that Steve’s oldest brother, Marv, was arguably the greatest play-by-play announcer in NBA history. And brother Al enjoyed a successful career behind the microphone after playing professional hockey.

Now Steve has written a memoir titled A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Broadcast Booth. Those who know him know that Steve doesn’t like to say bad things about people. And he doesn’t here. Nor does he delve into the inner workings of sports media or the sports dream machine. The book is largely a collection of lighthearted personal recollections, although there are times when the gravity of boxing forces reflection.

“Fighters were unlike any other professional athletes I had ever encountered,” Albert writes. “Many were products of incomprehensible backgrounds, fiercely tough neighborhoods, ghettos and, in some cases, jungles. Some got into the sport because they were bullied as children. For others, boxing was a means of survival. In many cases, it was an escape from a way of life that most people couldn’t even fathom.”

At one point, Steve recounts a ringside ritual that he followed when he was behind the microphone for Showtime Boxing: “I would precisely line up my trio of beverages – coffee, water, soda – on the far edge of the table closest to the ring apron. Perhaps the best advice I ever received from Ferdie [broadcast partner Ferdie Pacheco] was early on in my blow-by-blow career – ‘Always cover your coffee at ringside with an index card unless you like your coffee with cream, sugar, and blood.’”

Writing about the prelude to the infamous Holyfield-Tyson “bite fight,” Albert recalls, “I remember thinking that Tyson was going to do something unusual that night. I had this sinking feeling in my gut that he was going to pull something exceedingly out of the ordinary. His grousing about Holyfield’s head butts in the first fight added to my concern. [But] nobody could have foreseen what actually happened. Had I opened that broadcast with, ‘Folks, tonight I predict that Mike Tyson will bite off a chunk of Evander Holyfield’s ear,’ some fellas in white coats might have approached me and said, ‘Uh, Steve, could you come with us.'”

And then there’s my favorite line in the book: “I once asked a fighter if he was happily married,” Albert recounts. “He said, ‘Yes, but my wife’s not.'”

“All I ever wanted was to be a sportscaster,” Albert says in closing. “I didn’t always get it right, but I tried to do my job with honesty and integrity. For forty-five years, calling games was my life. I think it all worked out.”

Thomas Hauser’s email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His next book – The Most Honest Sport: Two More Years Inside Boxing – will be published this month and is available for preorder at:

https://www.amazon.com/Most-Honest-Sport-Inside-Boxing/dp/1955836329

In 2019, Hauser was selected for boxing’s highest honor – induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

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