Izzy Burgos, Inspirational Figure, Is Shot and Killed

Published

9 years ago

July 22, 2015

For a time, Izzadeen “Izzy” Burgos was one of boxing’s inspirational stories, a kid who dreamed of becoming a fighter despite the amputation of his left arm at the age of two. Despite his handicap, the then-12-year-old got the opportunity to fight at Philadelphia’s legendary Blue Horizon on June 24, 2005, overcoming an early knockdown at the hands of a two-armed opponent to make it to the final bell of a scheduled three-rounder. Burgos’ scrappiness moved many in the audience to tears.

Now Burgos is gone, at 21, the victim of an apparently intentional shooting Sunday night in the Feltonville section of Philadelphia. The young man was standing next to his father, Dennis, when he was shot in the face at point-blank range by the as-yet-unapprehended assailant. He was taken to Temple University Hospital where he was pronounced dead 2½ hours later, at 1:29 Monday morning.

But the tragic end of Izzy Burgos’ too-brief life might have been foreshadowed. Unable to be fitted with a comfortable prosthetic on the stump of the left arm that was surgically removed at the shoulder, Burgos – twice nominated for the Boxing Writers Association of America’s Courage in Overcoming Adversity Award – drifted away from boxing and into a life of petty and not-so-petty crime. He had a fairly extensive rap sheet, was incarcerated on several occasions, most recently for aggravated assault. He was released after doing time for that crime last September from Graterford State Correctional Institution, the same prison which lists former middleweight and light heavyweight Bernard Hopkins as an alumnus.

Joseph Santoliquito, now the president of the BWAA, was managing editor of The Ring magazine when he wrote about Burgos nearly 10 years ago. The story became something of a cause celebre, picked up by the Philadelphia Daily News, Philadelphia Inquirer and all the Philly television stations, as well as by The Ring and ESPN.com. There was even some talk about a possible book deal, with Santoliquito to serve as the author.

“But then things started to trickle back to me, and not good things, either,” Santoliquito told me after Burgos’ murder. “If I was going to do a feel-good story about a kid who had beaten the odds, there had to be a lot of positivity attached to it. There was a growing sense that that wasn’t the case.

“I really hadn’t spoken to Izzy in close to nine years, when he was still a kid. In my mind, I still prefer to picture him as that 12-year-old in the ring at the Blue Horizon. The kid he was fighting wasn’t pulling any punches, that was for sure. But Izzy got right up and fought back. They really went at it. Izzy – that Izzy – was a tough, determined boy.

“Did it sting me when I heard the news (that he was dead)? Yes. But I can’t say I was completely surprised. As I said, I heard some things that were disturbing. I hoped someone could get through to him in time to straighten him out. It’s like he was never given a chance, almost from birth, because of where he came from and what he was raised around. It’s a shame. The only moment he had to really shine was that night at the Blue Horizon.”

As a toddler, Izzy’s left arm was shattered beyond repair by a bullet from a high-powered rifle; his left lung was also punctured. His father claimed that Izzy had accidentally shot himself with the rifle, which seemed unlikely since the loaded weapon, carelessly placed under a bed in a home in which three children resided, was taller than he was. A jury wasn’t buying Dennis Burgos’ explanation of what had happened, and he was sentenced to eight to 20 years for recklessly endangering a child.

As little Izzy fought for his life, strangers appeared at his hospital room to extend to his family their prayers and best wishes for a speedy recovery. And the child did recover, although he faced a long convalescence and uncertain future.

Sports options are scarce for one-armed kids, but cruel putdowns aren’t when you grow up in a tough neighborhood.

“Sometimes people have told me I can’t do certain things,” Izzy said in October 2005. “That’s hard to take. Sometimes, I try (team) sports and other kids tell me I can’t play. They used to make fun of me. They never wanted to know anything about me and what I’ve been through. They don’t think I can play any sport because I have only one arm. I try to prove them wrong when I get the chance.”

That chance – and it was a long shot — was provided by a Philadelphia police officer, Edwin “Bo” Diaz, who ran a boxing program for children in a blighted section of North Philadelphia.

“We wanted to treat Izzy like any other kid and we taught him how to box with the mitts,” Diaz told Santoliquito at the time. “Izzy was well-accepted. He fell right into the pack of little kids and he performed better than most of them.”

But still … how do you risk putting a one-armed child in an actual bout? It was a conundrum that Diaz grappled with internally until he decided the boy deserved a chance to compete against another person, not just inanimate objects. With the help of Vernoca Michael, owner of the Blue Horizon, Diaz placed Izzy on the undercard of a pro show against another 12-year-old, Chris Delvalle, who had fought in several previous amateur bouts. There were no restrictions placed on Delvalle, who quickly floored Izzy. But Izzy fought back hard, winning over the crowd and a specially designed championship belt for himself.

“Izzy is a survivor,” Diaz said. “I know for a fact he taught himself how to ride a bicycle and he always had it in him that he could succeed at anything.”

He did not succeed at winning the BWAA’s first Courage in Overcoming Adversity Award; that went to Kassim Ouma, who was abducted as a child in his native Uganda and was forced to serve as a soldier with rebel forces before making his way to America, where he became the IBF super welterweight titlist and the subject of an acclaimed documentary about his against-all-odds life.

Izzy also was a finalist for the second BWAA Courage in Overcoming Adversity Award, but he lost out to someone a little better known than himself – Muhammad Ali. After that, as his brush with boxing receded into the past, he more or less faded from view, except with law enforcement officials who came to know him more for his transgressions on the street.

Interestingly, Izzy got close to his father, Dennis, after the older man was released from prison. When Izzy was shot, Dennis chased the shooter for a block or so before the man turned, fired at him, and ran off, police said.

“Everywhere he went, he made friends,” Izzy’s mother, Lisa, told the Philadelphia Inquirer. “He had a good heart,” she continued, telling young kids “that the streets are not the way.”

Diaz, now retired from the Philadelphia Police Department, told the Philly Daily News Izzy’s story “was like a `Rocky’ movie. Izzy had this incredible will to live, and a tremendous punch. We called him the `Bionic Arm.’”

And now?

“It’s a sad story,” Diaz said. “I’ve been getting calls from guys who feel like they should have done more for him. But in the end, everyone’s responsible for themselves.”

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Bernard Fernandez

The Challenge of Playing Muhammad Ali

Published

8 hours ago

December 18, 2024

Thomas Hauser

There have been countless dramatizations of Muhammad Ali’s life and more will follow in the years ahead. The most heavily marketed of these so far have been the 1977 movie titled The Greatest starring Ali himself and the 2001 biopic Ali starring Will Smith.

The Greatest was fictionalized. Its saving grace apart from Ali’s presence on screen was the song “The Greatest Love of All” which was written for the film and later popularized by Whitney Houston. Beyond that, the movie was mediocre. “Of all our sports heroes,” Frank Deford wrote, “Ali needs least to be sanitized. But The Greatest is just a big vapid valentine. It took a dive.”

The 2001 film was equally bland but without the saving grace of Ali on camera. “I hated that film,” Spike Lee said. “It wasn’t Ali.” Jerry Izenberg was in accord, complaining, “Will Smith playing Ali was an impersonation, not a performance.”

The latest entry in the Ali registry is a play running this week off-Broadway at the AMT Theater (354 West 45th Street) in Manhattan.

The One: The Life of Muhammad Ali was written by David Serero, who has produced and directed the show in addition to playing the role of Angelo Dundee in the three-man drama. Serero, age 43, was born in Paris, is of Moroccan-French-Jewish heritage, and has excelled professionally as an opera singer (baritone) and actor (stage and screen).

Let’s get the negatives out of the way first. The play is flawed. There are glaring factual inaccuracies in the script that add nothing to the dramatic arc and detract from its credibility.

On the plus side; Zack Bazile (pictured) is exceptionally good as Ali. And Serero (wearing his director’s hat) brings the most out of him.

Growing up, Bazile (now 28) excelled in multiple sports. In 2018, while attending Ohio State, he won the NCAA Long Jump Championship and was named Big Ten Field Athlete of the Year. He also dabbled in boxing, competed in two amateur fights in 2022, and won both by knockout. He began acting three years ago.

Serero received roughly one thousand resumes when he published notices for a casting call in search of an actor to play Ali. One-hundred-twenty respondents were invited to audition.

“I had people who looked like Ali and were accomplished actors,” Serero recalls. “But when they were in the room, I didn’t feel Ali in front of me. You have to remember; we’re dealing with someone who really existed and there’s video of him, so it’s not like asking someone to play George Washington.”

And Ali was Ali. That’s a hard act to follow.

Bazile is a near-perfect fit. At 6-feet-2-inches tall, 195 pounds, he conveys Ali’s physicality. His body is sculpted in the manner of the young Ali. He moves like an athlete because he is an athlete. His face resembles Ali’s and his expressions are very much on the mark in the way he transmits emotion to the audience. He uses his voice the way Ali did. He moves his eyes the way Ali did. He has THE LOOK.

Zack was born the year that Ali lit the Olympic flame in Atlanta, so he has no first-hand memory of the young Ali who set the world ablaze. “But as an actor,” he says, “I’m representing Ali. That’s a responsibility I take very seriously. Everyone has an essence about them. I had to find the right balance – not too over the top – and capture that.”

Sitting in the audience watching Bazile, I felt at times as though it was Ali onstage in front of me. Zack has the pre-exile Ali down perfectly. The magic dissipates a bit as the stage Ali grows older. Bazile still has to add the weight of aging to his craft. But I couldn’t help but think, “Muhammad would have loved watching Zack play him.”

****

Twenty-four hours after the premiere of The One, David Serero left the stage for a night to shine brightly in a real boxing ring., The occasion was the tenth fight card that Larry Goldberg has promoted at Sony Hall in New York, a run that began with Goldberg’s first pro show ever on October 13, 2022.

Most of the fights on the six-bout card played out as expected. But two were tougher for the favorites than anticipated. Jacob Riley Solis was held to a draw by Daniel Jefferson. And Andy Dominguez was knocked down hard by Angel Meza in round three before rallying to claim a one-point split-decision triumph.

Serero sang the national anthem between the second and third fights and stilled the crowd with a virtuoso performance. Fans at sports events are usually restless during the singing of the anthem. This time, the crowd was captivated. Serero turned a flat ritual into an inspirational moment. People were turning to each other and saying “Wow!”

****

The unexpected happened in Tijuana last Saturday night when 25-to-1 underdog Bruno Surace climbed off the canvas after a second-round knockdown to score a shocking, one-punch, sixth-round stoppage of Jaime Munguia. There has been a lot of commentary since then about what happened that night. The best explanation I’ve heard came from a fan named John who wrote, “The fight was not over in the second round although Munguia thought it was because, if he caught him once, he would naturally catch him again. Plus he looked at this little four KO guy [Surace had scored 4 knockouts in 27 fights] the way all the fans did, like he had no punch. That is what a fan can afford to do. But a fighter should know better. The ref reminds you, ‘Protect yourself at all times.’ Somebody forgot that.”

photo (c) David Serero

Thomas Hauser’s email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His most recent book – MY MOTHER and me – is a personal memoir available at Amazon.com. https://www.amazon.com/My-Mother-Me-Thomas-Hauser/dp/1955836191/ref=sr_1_1?crid=5C0TEN4M9ZAH&keywords=thomas+hauser&qid=1707662513&sprefix=thomas+hauser%2Caps%2C80&sr=8-1

In 2004, the Boxing Writers Association of America honored Hauser with the Nat Fleischer Award for career excellence in boxing journalism. In 2019, Hauser was selected for boxing’s highest honor – induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

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L.A.’s Rudy Hernandez is the 2024 TSS Trainer of the Year

Published

2 days ago

December 16, 2024

Arne K. Lang

L.A.’s Rudy Hernandez is the 2024 TSS Trainer of the Year

If asked to name a prominent boxing trainer who operates out of a gym in Los Angeles, the name Freddie Roach would jump immediately to mind. Best known for his work with Manny Pacquaio, Roach has been named the Trainer of the Year by the Boxing Writers Association of America a record seven times.

A mere seven miles from Roach’s iconic Wild Card Gym is the gym that Rudy Hernandez now calls home. Situated in the Little Tokyo neighborhood in downtown Los Angeles, the L.A. Boxing Gym – a relatively new addition to the SoCal boxing landscape — is as nondescript as its name. From the outside, one would not guess that two reigning world champions, Junto Nakatani and Anthony Olascuaga, were forged there.

As Freddie Roach will be forever linked with Manny Pacquiao, so will Rudy Hernandez be linked with Nakatani. The Japanese boxer was only 15 years old when his parents packed him off to the United States to be tutored by Hernandez. With Hernandez in his corner, the lanky southpaw won titles at 112 and 115 and currently holds the WBO bantamweight (118) belt. In his last start, he knocked out his Thai opponent, a 77-fight veteran who had never been stopped, advancing his record to 29-0 (22 KOs).

Nakatani’s name now appears on several pound-for-pound lists. A match with Japanese superstar Naoya Inoue is brewing. When that match comes to fruition, it will be the grandest domestic showdown in Japanese boxing history.

“Junto Nakatani is the greatest fighter I’ve ever trained. It’s easy to work with him because even when he came to me at age 15, his focus was only on boxing. It was to be a champion one day and nothing interfered with that dream,” Hernandez told sports journalist Manouk Akopyan writing for Boxing Scene.

Akin to Nakatani, Rudy Hernandez built Anthony Olascuaga from scratch. The LA native was rucked out of obscurity in April of 2023 when Jonathan Gonzalez contracted pneumonia and was forced to withdraw from his date in Tokyo with lineal light flyweight champion Kenshiro Teraji. Olascuaga, with only five pro fights under his belt, filled the breach on 10 days’ notice and although he lost (TKO by 9), he earned kudos for his gritty performance against the man recognized as the best fighter in his weight class.

Two fights later, back in Tokyo, Olascuaga copped the WBO world flyweight title with a third-round stoppage of Riku Kano. His first defense came in October, again in Japan, and Olascuaga retained his belt with a first-round stoppage of the aforementioned Gonzalez. (This bout was originally ruled a no-contest as it ended after Gonzalez suffered a cut from an accidental clash of heads. But the referee ruled that Gonzalez was fit to continue before the Puerto Rican said “no mas,” alleging his vision was impaired, and the WBO upheld a protest from the Olascuaga camp and changed the result to a TKO. Regardless, Rudy Hernandez’s fighter would have kept his title.)

Hernandez, 62, is the brother of the late Genaro “Chicanito” Hernandez. A two-time world title-holder at 130 pounds who fought the likes of Azumah Nelson, Oscar De La Hoya and Floyd Mayweather Jr., Chicanito passed away in 2011, a cancer victim at age 45.

Genaro “Chicanito” Hernandez was one of the most popular fighters in the Hispanic communities of Southern California. Rudy Hernandez, a late bloomer of sorts – at least in terms of public recognition — has kept his brother’s flame alive with own achievements. He is a worthy honoree for the 2024 Trainer of the Year.

Note: This is the first in our series of annual awards. The others will arrive sporadically over the next two weeks.

Photo credit: Steve Kim

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A Shocker in Tijuana: Bruno Surace KOs Jaime Munguia !!

Published

4 days ago

December 15, 2024

Arne K. Lang

A-Shocker-in-Tijuana-Bruno-Sarace-KOs-Jaime-Munguia

It was a chilly night in Tijuana when Jaime Munguia entered the ring for his homecoming fight with Bruno Surace. The main event of a Zanfer/Top Rank co-promotion, Munguia vs. Surace was staged in the city’s 30,000-seat soccer stadium a stone’s throw from the U.S. border in the San Diego metroplex.

Surace, a Frenchman, brought a 25-0-2 record and a 22-fight winning streak, but a quick glance at his record showed that he had scant chance of holding his own with the house fighter. Only four of Surace’s 25 wins had come by stoppage and only eight of his wins had come against opponents with winning records. Munguia was making the first start in the city of his birth since February 2022. Surace had never fought outside Europe.

But hold the phone!

After losing every round heading into the sixth, Surace scored the Upset of the Year, ending the contest with a one-punch knockout.

It looked like a short and easy night for Munguia when he knocked Surace down with a left hook in the second stanza. From that point on, the Frenchman fought off his back foot, often with back to the ropes, throwing punches only in spurts. Munguia worked the body well and was seemingly on the way to wearing him down when he was struck by lightning in the form of an overhand right.

Down went Munguia, landing on his back. He struggled to get to his feet, but the referee waived it off a nano-second before reaching “10.” The official time was 2:36 of round six.

Munguia, who was 44-1 heading in with 35 KOs, was as high as a 35/1 favorite. In his only defeat, he had gone the distance with Canelo Alvarez. This was the biggest upset by a French fighter since Rene Jacquot outpointed Donald Curry in 1989 and Jacquot had the advantage of fighting in his homeland.

Co-Main

Mexico City’s Alan Picasso, ranked #1 by the WBC at 122 pounds, scored a third-round stoppage of last-minute sub Yehison Cuello in a scheduled 10-rounder contested at featherweight. Picaso (31-0-1, 17 KOs) is a solid technician. He ended the bout with a left to the rib cage, a punch that weaved around Cuello’s elbow and didn’t appear to be especially hard. The referee stopped his count at “nine” and waived the fight off.

A 29-year-old Colombian who reportedly had been training in Tijuana, the overmatched Cuello slumped to 13-3-1.

Other Bouts of Note

In a ho-hum affair, junior middleweight Jorge Garcia advanced to 32-4 (26) with a 10-round unanimous decision over Uzbekistan’s Kudratillo Abudukakhorov (20-4). The judges had it 97-92 and 99-90 twice. There were no knockdowns, but Garcia had a point deducted in round eight for low blows.

Garcia displayed none of the power that he showed in his most recent fight three months ago in Arizona and when he knocked out his German opponent in 46 seconds. Abudukakhorov, who has competed mostly as a welterweight, came in at 158 1/4 pounds and didn’t look in the best of shape. The Uzbek was purportedly 170-10 as an amateur (4-5 per boxrec).

Super bantamweight Sebastian Hernandez improved to 18-0 (17 KOs) with a seventh-round stoppage of Argentine import Sergio Martin (14-5). The end came at the 2:39 mark of round seven when Martin’s corner threw in the towel. Earlier in the round, Martin lost his mouthpiece and had a point deducted for holding.

Hernandez wasn’t all that impressive considering the high expectations born of his high knockout ratio, but appeared to have injured his right hand during the sixth round.

Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank

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