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TWO SECONDS FROM GLORY, TWO SECONDS TO HEARTBREAK

Two seconds.
How long is that? Maybe long enough for 1½ beats of the average human being’s heart, or for a long inbounds pass to Duke All-America Christian Laettner, who made one of the most memorable buzzer-beating shots in college basketball history.
It is but a tiny snippet of time, a few blinks of the eye, a sneeze, a hiccup. But a snippet is enough to make the difference between a gold medal and a silver in the Olympics, or between victory and defeat in one of the most controversial boxing matches ever.
The Ring magazine very well might have selected the epic first clash between undefeated super lightweight champions Julio Cesar Chavez and Meldrick Taylor its Fight of the Year for 1990 even had that bout ended two seconds sooner. But those two seconds had yet to tick off, and the nature of the bout’s conclusion – with referee Richard Steele waving his arms and awarding Chavez, who was too far behind on the scorecards to win on points, even with the benefit of his 12th-round knockdown of Taylor – has stamped it as a matter of perennial debate. Should Steele, who had to be aware of the flashing red light in his field of vision as he administered a standing-eight count to a badly shaken Taylor, signifying that the fight was in its final few seconds, have allowed the Philadelphian the benefit of that sneeze or hiccup? Or did Steele, who was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 2014, make the right call, one rendered on the side of caution?
So incredible was the unification fight of two 140-pound kings at the height of their powers – the 23-year-old Taylor, the IBF titlist, went in at 24-0-1, with 13 knockouts, to 67-0 with 49 wins inside the distance for Chavez, 27, the WBC ruler and Mexican national hero — that Chavez-Taylor got that Fight of the Year nod over a little scrap in Tokyo five weeks earlier, in which a 42-to-1 longshot named Buster Douglas knocked out heavyweight champion Mike Tyson, the most fearsome visitor to the Land of the Rising Sun since Godzilla.
I was at ringside for both fights, and although Tyson-Douglas was undoubtedly the bigger event from a historical perspective, given the aura of invincibility that clung to Tyson that afternoon (because of the 14-hour time difference between the East Coast and Japan, the bout began Sunday afternoon in Japan, Saturday night in the U.S.), but Chavez-Taylor, to me, was the more compelling scrap. It was, in every sense of the word, worthy of all the hype, which might or might not be the case when welterweight champs Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao swap punches in an even-more-anticipated unification pairing on May 2 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.
It was my opinion then, and now, that Taylor deserved the victory he had earned in the first 35 minutes, 58 seconds of a war for the ages. Chavez knew there were only a few seconds remaining until the final bell, and he was right behind Steele, poised to charge forward and get in one last, telling lick. Had Steele signaled Chavez to return to the farthest neutral corner, the fight almost certainly would have ended in a Taylor split-decision victory.
There were, however, other ingredients in the bubbling broth of woulda-coulda-shoulda. What if Taylor co-trainer Lou Duva, an excitable sort under the best of circumstances, not mounted the ring apron and distracted Taylor, who turned his head to look at Duva instead of Steele when the referee was asking him if he was OK? It can be argued that Duva’s actions were tantamount to a towel toss, signifying surrender. But had Steele even noticed him?
What didn’t wash, at least to me, was Steele – whose integrity I didn’t question then, nor do now – saying that he treated all fighters the same, be they journeymen or celebrated world champions. It was Steele who, queried about his reluctance to call a halt in the third round of WBC middleweight champion Thomas Hearns’ June 6, 1988, defense against Iran Barkley, with ample time left on the clock and Hearns badly hurt and sagging against the ropes, said that, “Thomas Hearns is a great champion, and great champions deserve the opportunity to fight their way out of trouble.”
Make no mistake: What happened to Meldrick Taylor, whose downward spiral after the first Chavez fight (he was stopped in eight rounds in the rematch, on Sept 17, 1994), would have happened regardless of the outcome. The damage he absorbed from JCC’s heavy blows that night at the Las Vegas Hilton, it became increasingly obvious, was irreversible. Although Taylor, a gold medalist at 17 at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, would go on to capture another world title, scoring a unanimous decision over WBA super lightweight champion Aaron Davis on Jan. 19, 1991, and successfully defending it twice, he was a ghost of his former brilliance in losing on a fourth-round TKO when he challenged WBC super welterweight king Terry Norris on May 9, 1992.
What Chavez started, Norris clearly finished, so much so that Taylor, who had retained his WBA welterweight championship, was never a factor in relinquishing the title a one-sided, eighth-round stoppage to Crisanto Espana on Oct. 31, 1992, in London, on the undercard of heavyweight Lennox Lewis’ –round blowout of Razor Ruddock. So alarmed was Lou Duva by what he saw of Taylor, who at his finest could not possibly have been beaten by the likes of Espana, that he urged Taylor – then all of 26 — to immediately retire. Not surprisingly, Taylor refused. He would go 6-5 in his final 11 bouts, mostly against second- and third-tier opposition.
“I love the kid and I’m not going to let him get hurt,” Duva said after Taylor’s beatdown from Espana. “As far as I’m concerned, he shouldn’t fight again. He’s a great person and he’s been a great champion. He’s recovered from every disappointment he’s had in this sport, and he’ll recover from this.
“There’s been some wise guys who’ll try to convince him to keep on fighting, but it’s pretty obvious he’s through. I wouldn’t even put him in there with a four-round preliminary guy. Why? Because it only would take one punch to do it (seriously hurt Taylor).”
Had Taylor survived Chavez’s desperate 12th-round onslaught, would he have merited the win that seemingly had been within his grasp? That is a matter of judging preference; it was clear that Taylor, whose blurring hand speed was a marvel to behold, had the edge in quantity, landing punches in bunches. But Chavez packed more pop, so give him the upper hand for the impact of those shots that did connect. After the fight, Taylor spent the night at Valley View Hospital where he was treated for dehydration, a lacerated tongue and a small fracture in the bone behind his left eye. He also lost two pints of blood during the course of the bout.
“It was sad to see Meldrick last night,” Taylor’s twin brother, Eldrick, said of one of the more heartbreaking defeats ever suffered by any fighter. “`Two seconds,’” he kept repeating. “Two seconds.”
Those two seconds, truth be told, have haunted Meldrick Taylor until this day. They no doubt will haunt him for the rest of a life shrouded in recriminations.
“I think I fought the best fight I could have fought,” he said upon his release from the hospital. “I beat Chavez at his own game. A lot of people said he was going to wear me down with body shots, but I gave more than 100 percent. And then for the referee to stop it like that … it was traumatic for me.”
Until Steele waved his arms, Taylor – who, perhaps unwisely, had been advised by Duva before the climactic 12th round to continue to take the fight to Chavez instead of sitting on his presumed lead – was too far ahead to be caught on points. His rapid-fire combinations had found favor with judges Jerry Roth and Dave Moretti, who had him ahead by respective margins of 108-101 and 107-102, with Chuck Giampa favoring Chavez by 105-104. And for those who would argue that Taylor was foolish in not getting on his bicycle, remember that Oscar De La Hoya thought he was too far ahead to lose a decision to Felix Trinidad. Chavez’s status as a hugely popular Mexican icon might have had the Duva corner leery that the scorecards weren’t as tilted in their man’s favor as it turned out.
Lou Duva and his son, Dan, the Main Events president who served as Taylor’s promoter, reacted to the sudden, shocking ending by seeking to have the result overturned, citing violations of IBF rule 14, WBC rule 12 and NSAC rule 467.740, all of which essentially are the same. It was their contention that Steele, by not directing Chavez to the farthest neutral corner, had made a mistake that in essence deprived Taylor of his greatest moment of professional glory. But those official protests were not upheld, and neither was their alternative demand that the fight be declared a no-contest, which would have allowed Taylor to retain his IBF belt.
HBO revisited that amazing fight, and its aftermath, in 2002 with the documentary “Legendary Nights: The Tale of Chavez-Taylor,” with arguments made on both sides of the issue.
“I thought Richard Steele made a bad stoppage,” offered Larry Merchant, HBO’s longtime fight analyst. “Meldrick Taylor fought his heart out. He had earned the right of those extra two seconds.”
Counterpoints were offered by Boston sports columnist Ron Borges, and, of course, Steele.
“It was hard initially to step back and reallylook at what had happened,” Borges opined. “One guy (Taylor) got assaulted at the end, is what happened. Should they have stopped the fight? Yeah, they should have stopped the fight.”
Added Steele: “I was really thrilled to be selected for this fight … Really, a great moment in my life. I never regretted what I did.”
Again, the whirling dervish that had been Meldrick Taylor ceased to exist that March night a quarter-century ago. It was a fight that cost him a significant chunk of his prime, additional financial benefits (he had agreed to a six-bout, $10 million-to-$12 million contract extension with HBO, contingent on his winning) and, sadly, his health. His gift literally had been beaten out of him.
In the HBO documentary, Las Vegas ring physician Margaret Goodman said that Taylor, whose slurred speech just a few years after the Chavez fight was in marked contrast to the pre-Chavez model, “shows all evidence of chronic brain injury,” and that his continued participation as an active boxer makes me embarrassed for the sport.”
Some people – those who don’t understand the thrall in which boxing holds its participants — have told me that Muhammad Ali stayed too long at the fair, that if they were in his place and knew what awaited him, they would never even have taken up such a dangerous occupation. But there are others who gladly would risk all to know, even for a day, what it must feel like to be one of the most charismatic and admired athletes ever to walk the face of the earth. There is a steep price that sometimes must be paid to achieve extraordinary things, and I have to believe a significant percentage of those who never come close to breaking free from the shackles of the mundane would accept future diminishment for true greatness in the full bloom of their youth.
Meldrick Taylor came so very close to having it all, and one can only wonder if he could more easily accept his sad present circumstances had he only had the benefit of two seconds that forever will be just beyond his grasp.
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With Valentine’s Day on the Horizon, let’s Exhume ex-Boxer ‘Machine Gun’ McGurn

With Valentine’s Day on the Horizon, let’s Exhume ex-Boxer ‘Machine Gun’ McGurn
Feb. 14, which this year falls on a Friday, is Valentine’s Day, more formally St. Valentine’s Day. It’s a day identified with romance, but for students of organized crime, it summons up an image of a different sort. On Valentine’s Day in 1929, at a warehouse in the Lincoln Park district of Chicago, seven men were lined up against a wall and murdered in cold blood by four intruders with machine guns and shotguns. The infamous St. Valentine’s Day Massacre was the most sensational news story during the Prohibition Era when many of America’s cities, most notably Chicago, were roiled by deadly turf wars between rival bootlegging factions.
It shouldn’t surprise us that a former boxer was one of the alleged perpetrators. During the Prohibition years, bootleggers were well-represented among the ranks of boxing promoters and managers. Philadelphia’s Max “Boo Boo” Hoff reportedly had the largest boxing stable in the country. In New York, Owney Madden was purportedly the brains behind the consortium that controlled future heavyweight champion Primo Carnera.
That brings us to Jack McGurn, but first a little context. Prohibition was the law of the land from 1920, when the Volstead Act took effect, until 1933 when the ill-conceived law was repealed. Prohibition did not fetter America’s thirst for alcoholic beverages but arguably encouraged it. Confirmed beer drinkers didn’t stop drinking beer because it was illegal. Restaurateurs at high-end establishments didn’t stop selling cognac and brandy; they just did it more discreetly. Speakeasies became fashionable.
Big money awaited entrepreneurs willing to risk arrest by flouting the law, either by opening distilleries and breweries or importing alcohol with Canada the leading supplier.
In Chicago and environs, circa 1929, two of the kingpins of the bootlegging trade were “Scarface” Al Capone and George “Bugs” Moran. They were bitter rivals. The warehouse at which the seven men were assassinated housed some of Moran’s delivery trucks. The victims were members of his gang.
Al Capone wasn’t directly involved. On Feb. 14, he was in Florida where, among other things, he was finalizing arrangements to host a bevy of A-list sportswriters at his lavish Miami Beach estate; the scribes were coming to town to cover the heavyweight title eliminator between Jack Sharkey and Young Stribling. But the hired guns, who stormed into Moran’s warehouse at 10:30 on a snowy Valentine’s Day morning, were presumed to be working for Capone and the one henchman whose name stood out among the usual suspects was Jack McGurn. He had purportedly saved Capone’s life on two occasions by intercepting would-be assassins out to kill his boss and shooting them dead. Of all his underlings, Capone was said to be especially fond of McGurn.

Machine Gun Jack McGurn
It had long been the custom of Jewish and Italian boxers to adopt Irish-sounding ring names. McGurn was born Vincenzo Gibaldi in 1902 in the Sicilian seaside city of Licata and lived in Brooklyn before moving with his widowed mother to Chicago. He had his first documented prizefight in 1921. The bout was held on a naval training ship, the U.S.S. Commodore. Prizefighting was then illegal in the Windy City, a residue of the malodorous 1900 fight between Terry McGovern and Joe Gans, but the ship was docked outside the Chicago city limits.
McGurn would have five more documented fights, the last against Bud Christiano on a strong card in Aurora, Illinois. Their six-round bout was the semi-windup. The main go was a 10-round contest between bantamweights Bud Taylor, the Terre Haute Terror, and Memphis Pal Moore, both of whom are enshrined in the International Boxing Hall of Fame.
By law, these were no-decision fights with wagers resting on the opinion of one or more ringside reporters. McGurn really had no business in the same ring with Christiano, an 84-fight veteran who had won two of three from future world lightweight title-holder Jimmy Goodrich. He took the worst of it, but was still standing at the final bell. And that was that. After only six pro fights, he hung up his gloves to pursue other endeavors and, in time, when his name appeared in the newspapers, it invariably appeared as Machine Gun Jack McGurn, the reference to the newfangled Thompson Machine Gun, colloquially the Tommy Gun, a tool with which McGurn was said to be very proficient.
The police found McGurn holed up in a Chicago hotel where he was staying with his girlfriend, Louise Rolfe, a 22-year-old “professional model and cabaret entertainer” with a 5-year-old daughter from a previous relationship that was being raised by her mother.
Louise testified that on the day of the massacre, they were in bed until noon. She said that she and McGurn had seldom left the room during their 13-day stay, having their food brought up from the hotel’s kitchen.
Louise held tight to her story and the police never did have sufficient evidence to charge the ex-boxer in connection with the crime. However, whenever the authorities were frustrated in sending a perp to prison, they had other weapons at their disposal to get their pound of flesh.
In the case of Scarface Al Capone, it was the 1913 law that authorized a federal income tax. The feds had enough circumstantial evidence to show that Al hadn’t been paying his fair share of taxes and succeeded in removing him from society. (After serving almost eight years in federal prisons, mostly Alcatraz, Capone returned to civilian life a sick man and passed away in Florida at age 48.)
In the case of Machine Gun Jack McGurn and his paramour, later his wife, the wedge was the Mann Act of 1910.
The Mann Act, most famously used to waylay heavyweight champion Jack Johnson, was aimed at brothel-keepers and immigrant flesh peddlers but was worded in such a way that it could be deployed when there was no commerce involved. It prohibited the interstate transportation of “any woman or girl for the purpose of prostitution or debauchery, or for any other immoral purpose.” (The law remains on the books but has been watered-down to decriminalize sexual activity between consenting adults.)
The feds spent thousands of hours digging up evidence to show that the couple had violated the Mann Act. They eventually got hotel receipts showing that they had registered as Mr. and Mrs. under assumed names at hotels in Florida and Mississippi during a motor trip down south. Jack was sentenced to two years in Leavenworth and Louise to four months in the county jail, but their convictions were later overturned by the Illinois Supreme Court.
What comes around, goes around, goes the saying, and it figured that Machine Gun Jack McGurn would die a violent death. The ex-boxer met his maker at 1 a.m. on Feb. 15, 1936, at a second-floor bowling alley in Chicago where he was fatally shot by two gunmen who opened fire as his back was turned. There were at least 20 people present said the story in the Chicago Tribune, but “the wall of silence, traditional among the gangsters and the people who know them, was erected high and tight.”
Was McGurn’s murder retaliation for the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre? The answer appears to be a resounding “yes.” Had the deed happened before the stroke of midnight, it would have happened on a St. Valentine’s Day, the seventh anniversary of the infamous event.
The police found a crumpled comic Valentine’s card next to McGurn’s body. On the front of the card were the figures of a man and a woman in their underwear. The verse inside read:
You’ve lost your job, You’ve lost your dough;
Your jewels and cars and handsome houses;
But things could still be worse you know
At least you haven’t lost your trousers.
Was this card intentionally left there by the assassins? We don’t know, but the view from here (pardon the wisecrack) is that if one were to receive a card on Valentine’s Day bearing this poem, perhaps it would be best not to leave the house.
Postscript #1: Jack McGurn’s wife, the former Louise Rolfe, routinely referenced in the press as his blonde alibi, continued to have her name pop up in the news after he died. In February of 1940, police found a gun used in a burglary in a drawer in her apartment. In 1943, she was arrested on a charge of disorderly conduct after police found her in the company of a 25-year-old Army deserter.
Postscript #2:
Al Capone refused to pose for photographs, but made an exception for his friend Jack Sharkey, the future heavyweight champion. Sharkey is pictured on the right next to Capone in this 1929 photo.
****
The Mob Museum, officially the National Museum of Organized Crime and Law Enforcement, opened 13 years ago on Feb. 14, 2012 in an old three-story building in downtown Las Vegas that was originally a federal courthouse. So, each Valentine’s Day is a special occasion at the Mob Museum, an anniversary celebrated with special events, free admission for Nevada residents, and steep discounts for tourists. (On other days of the year, a single admission during peak hours is $34.95, but there are always discounts available on-line.)
A permanent display is a reconstructed portion of the wall where the seven victims were murdered. The garage where the killings happened was demolished in 1967, but before it was torn down a collector rescued many of the bricks, some with blood-stained bullet holes, which the Mob Museum acquired. Other artifacts on display this Friday will be the two Tommy Guns used in the assault, a one-day loan from the Berrian County Sheriff’s Department in Michigan which recovered the weapons from the home of a bank robber.
For the record, there is also a mob museum, called the Gangster Museum of America, in Hot Springs, Arkansas.
A recognized authority on the history of prizefighting and the history of American sports gambling, TSS editor-in-chief Arne K. Lang is the author of five books including “Prizefighting: An American History,” released by McFarland in 2008 and re-released in a paperback edition in 2020.
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More ‘Dances’ in Store for Derek Chisora after out-working Otto Wallin in Manchester

Tonight’s fight at Co-op Live Arena in Manchester between Derek Chisora and Otto Wallin bore the tagline “Last Dance.” The reference was to Chisora who at age 41 was on the cusp of his last hurrah. However, when the IBF went and certified the match as an eliminator, that changed the equation and, truth be told, Chisora would have likely soldiered on regardless of the outcome.
The UK boxing fans have embraced Chisora, an honest workman, never an elite fighter, but always a tough out. They certainly hope to see him in action again and they will get their wish. Tonight, he made more fans with a hard-earned, unanimous decision over 34-year-old Swedish southpaw Otto Wallin who went to post a small favorite.
Chisora came out fast, pressuring the Swede while keeping his hands busy. He was comfortably ahead after five rounds, but was seemingly ripe for a comedown after cuts developed above and below his right eye. Fortunately for him, he had the prominent Canadian cutman Russ Amber in his corner.
Chisora scored two knockdowns before the fight was finished. The first came in round nine when Chisora caught Wallin with a punch that landed high on his temple. In a delayed reaction, Wallin went flying backward, landing on his butt. Wallin recovered nicely and had his best round in the next frame.
Wallin appeared to be winning the final round when Chisora put the explanation point on his performance just as the final bell was about to ring, catching the Swede off-balance with a cuffing right hand that sent him to the floor once again. If not for that knockdown, there would have been some controversy when the scores were read. The tallies were 117-109, 116-110, and 114-112, the latter of which was too generous to Wallin (27-3).
“I love the sport and I love the fans,” said Derek Chisora (36-13, 23 KOs), addressing the audience in his post-fight interview. His next bout will likely come against the winner of the match between Daniel Dubois and Joseph Parker happening later this month in Saudi Arabia.
Semi-wind-up
Stoke-on-Kent middleweight Nathan Heaney disappointed his large contingent of rooters when he was upset by French invader Sofiane Khati. The 35-year-old Heaney, who was 18-1-1 heading in, started well and was slightly ahead after six frames when things turned sour.
Both landed hard punches simultaneously in round seven, but the Frenchman’s punch was more damaging, knocking out Heaney’s mouthpiece and putting him on the canvas. When he arose, Khati, a 6/1 underdog, charged after him and forced the referee to intrude, saving Heaney from more punishment. The official time was 1:08 of round seven. It was the sixth win in the last seven tries for Khati (18-5, 7 KOs) who, akin to Chisora, is enjoying a late-career resurgence.
Other Bouts of Note
Lancashire junior welterweight Jack Rafferty was an 18/1 favorite over Morecambe ditch digger Reece MacMillan and won as expected. MacMillan’s corner tossed in the towel at the 1:08 mark of round seven. Rafferty’s record now stands at 25-0 (16 KOs), giving him the longest current unbeaten run of any British boxer. It was the second loss in 19 starts for MacMillan.
In a lackluster performance, Zach Parker, now competing as a light heavyweight, improved his record to 26-1 (19) with a 10-round decision over France’s Mickael Diallo (21-2-2) who took the bout on five days’ notice after Parker’s original opponent Willy Hutchinson suffered a bad shoulder injury in sparring and had to withdraw. The scores were 98-92, 98-93, and 97-94.
Parker’s lone defeat came in a domestic showdown with John Ryder, a match in which he could not continue after four rounds because of a broken hand. The prize for Ryder was a date with Canelo Alvarez. Mickael Diallo has another fight booked in four weeks in Long Beach, California.
Also
Featherweight Zak Miller scored the biggest win of his career, capturing a pair of regional trinkets with a 12-round majority decision over Masood Abdulah. The judges had it 115-113, 115-114, and 114-114.
Heading in, Miller was 15-1 but had defeated only one opponent with a winning record. It was the first pro loss for Abdulah (11-1), an Afghanistan-born Londoner.
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Avila Perspective, Chap. 313: The Misadventures of Canelo and Jake Paul (and More)

Avila Perspective, Chap. 313: The Misadventures of Canelo and Jake Paul (and More)
Boxing news has taken a weird arc.
For the past 20 years or so, social media has replaced newspapers, radio and television as a source for boxing news.
And one thing is certain:
You cannot truly rely on many social media accounts to be accurate. Unless they are connected to actual reputable journalists. There are not that many.
Claims of Saul “Canelo” Alvarez and Jake Paul reaching an agreement to fight each other this year were rampant on social media sites. No contracts had been signed between the two parties, but several social media accounts claimed the fight was happening. One claimed: “it was official.”
It is not happening as of Friday Feb. 7. 10 a.m. Pacific Time.
A statement by Most Valuable Promotions was sent Friday Feb. 7, to various boxing publications that emphasized the Canelo-Paul fight is not official.
“MVP was deep in negotiations for a blockbuster fight between Jake Paul and Canelo Alvarez on Cinco de Mayo weekend in Las Vegas…This situation is a reminder not to believe everything you read.”
The past few days numerous social media accounts were posting erroneously that Paul and Canelo Alvarez were fighting on a certain date and place. It was jumped on by other social media accounts like Piranhas and gobbled up and spit out as actual verified news.
Fake news is happening more and more. I hate that term but it’s becoming more common.
Many accounts on social media sites are not trained journalists. They don’t understand that being the first to spit out news is not as important as being accurate.
Also, there is no such thing as using the term “according to sources” without naming the source. Who made the claim?
Third, verification of a fight comes from the promoters. They are the most reliable methods of verifying a pending fight. It’s their job. Don’t rely on a fighter, a trainer or somebody’s friend. Call the promoter involved and they will verify.
Otherwise, it’s just rumor and exaggeration.
There are social media accounts with trained journalists. Find out which social media accounts are connected to actual news media sources and established by trained journalists. A real journalist verifies a story before it is published.
R.I.P. Michael Katz
Recently, a highly respected journalist, Michael Katz, passed away. He wrote for various newspapers including the New York Times and for various boxing web sites such as Maxboxing.com and a few others.
Katz covered prize fights beginning in 1968 with the heavyweight fight between Floyd Patterson and Jimmy Ellis. Read the full story in www.TheSweetscience.com by Arne Lang.
I first came across Katz probably in 1994 when I began covering boxing events as a writer for the L.A .Times. During media press conferences Katz was one of the more prominent writers and very outspoken.
The New York-bred Katz could tell you stories about certain eras in boxing. I happened to overhear one or two while sitting around a dinner buffet in the media rooms in Las Vegas. He always had interesting things to say.
Boxing writers come in waves during each era. Today this new era of boxing writers has dwindled to almost nothing. Writing has been overtaken by boxing videographers. The problem is during an actual fight, videographers cannot record the fight itself. The media companies sponsoring the fight cards don’t allow it. So, after a fight is completed, very few descriptions of a fight exist. Only interviews.
Written journalism is shrinking due to the lack of newspapers, magazines and periodicals. The only sure way to know what happened is by seeing the fight on tape. You won’t see many stories on a bulletin board at a boxing gym because there are fewer boxing writers today. The written history of a championship fight has shrunk to almost nothing.
Katz was one of the superb writers from the 1960s to the 2000s. It’s a shrinking base that gets smaller every day. It’s a dying breed but there are still some remaining.
Fights in SoCal
All Star Boxing returns with two female fights on the card on Saturday Feb. 8, at Commerce Casino in Commerce, Calif.
Stephanie Simon (1-0) and Archana Sharma (3-2) are scheduled to headline the boxing card in a super lightweight main event. Others on the boxing event include Ricardo De La Torre, Bryan Albarran and Jose Mancilla to name a few.
Doors open at 6 p.m. No one under 14 will be admitted. For more information call (323) 816-6200.
Fights to Watch
Sat. DAZN 10:30 a.m. Derek Chisora (35-13) vs Otto Wallin (27-2).
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