Politics Aside, Passionate Boxing Fan John McCain was an American Hero

Definition of a “hero,” from the Merriam-Webster dictionary: “A person admired for achievements and noble qualities; one who shows great courage.”

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Published

7 years ago

August 28, 2018

Bernard Fernandez

Definition of a “hero,” from the Merriam-Webster dictionary: “A person admired for achievements and noble qualities; one who shows great courage.”

Sen. John McCain, the difficult-to-categorize, at least in a political sense, Republican senator from Arizona, was four days shy of his 82^nd birthday when on Aug. 25 he finally succumbed to the ravishing effects of gliobastoma, a rare form of brain cancer he was first diagnosed as having on July 14, 2017. Those with aggressive GBM, as it is known in its shortened form, have a median survival period of 14 months, meaning the combative former Navy pilot did not outlive normal projections for those similarly stricken. For those familiar with the incredible true story of a genuine American hero, Sen. McCain’s adherence to any kind of norm must seem odd. His admirers – and they are many, including those who often opposed his positions as a two-time presidential candidate, two-term congressman and six-term senator – can be excused for somehow believing that a man who had survived as much as John Sidney McCain III had could somehow do it again if only through the force of his will and, maybe, his genetic makeup. Among his surviving family members is his 106-year-old mother, Roberta.

“It’s been quite a ride,” McCain, acknowledging the inevitability of his latest confrontation with the specter of death, wrote in a memoir published in May. “I’ve known great passions, seen amazing wonders, fought in a war, and helped make peace. I’ve lived very well and I’ve been deprived of all comforts. I’ve been as lonely as a person can be and I’ve enjoyed the company of heroes. I’ve suffered the deepest despair and experienced the highest exultation.

“I made a small place for myself in the story of America and the history of my times.”

A small place in the multifaceted story of John McCain, one that almost surely will not be mentioned this week by former presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, among those expected to speak at McCain’s Thursday funeral service at Washington National Cathedral (a private funeral is planned for Sunday at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md.), is the former USNA boxer’s unabashed love of the sport, and his relentless championing of its participants.

McCain co-authored, along with Sen. Richard Bryan (D-Nev.), the Professional Boxing Safety Act, which became law on July 1, 1997, and he also sponsored the Muhammad Ali Boxing Reform Act, which became law on May 26, 2000. He would have preferred to go even further, but his vision of providing pension and unionized protections for professional boxers ran into the sort of legislative roadblocks that have become all too common in a political landscape marked by increasing partisanship. The biggest impediment to a boxers’ union and pension plan is the international aspect of boxing, with two of the four major world sanctioning bodies headquartered abroad: the WBA in Venezuela and the WBC in Mexico. It can be argued that the WBO, based in Puerto Rico, also is under “foreign” purview, although the Caribbean island is a territory of the United States.

“As long as there is not a pension plan or a union – and I say that as a conservative Republican – I don’t believe you in any way can compare what the fighters receive to that of other professional sports,” McCain said in 2000, during his first presidential run that ended with his party’s nomination going to George W. Bush. “Every other major professional sport in this country has unions and pension plans.”

McCain’s failed push for unionization in pro boxing ran contrary to the prevailing mood of the Republican hierarchy, and so was his advocacy for a bill that would have created the formation of a three-person commission within the Commerce Department to regulate the sport in America. On Nov. 16, 2005, the U.S. House of Representatives voted, 233-190, against the proposed bill. Interestingly, Democrats voted for the proposed legislation by 146-50, but the GOP shot it down by a 183-43 margin. It is one of several instances where McCain, considered something of a political maverick, reached across the aisle on matters he considered to be of enough importance to transcend party orthodoxy.

But if Americans at large paid little heed to McCain’s hit-or-miss boxing crusades, the fighters whose circumstances he strove to improve took notice. Among those who lauded him was IBF middleweight champion Bernard Hopkins.

“Sen. McCain is a true hero in my eyes,” Hopkins said in July 2000. “I know his history. You have to know who you’re dealing with, right? This is a man who was in a prison camp and could have been released early, but he didn’t want to leave his friends. That tells me something.”

The son and grandson of Navy admirals also named John McCain, there is a strong likelihood John III (one of his sons, John IV, is a fourth-generation Naval Academy graduate now serving as a Navy helicopter pilot) would have remained in the military until he reached mandatory retirement age and risen in rank to join his distinguished forebears were it not for the events of Oct. 26, 1967, when a surface-to-air missile struck his Skyhawk dive bomber on a mission over Hanoi. Its right wing destroyed, the crippled aircraft hurtled toward Truc Bach Lake when McCain parachuted to … well, not exactly safety. The force of his ejection from the plane broke his right leg and both arms, knocking him unconscious. Sinking to the depths of what might have been his watery grave, McCain came to, ignoring the pain as best he could, and somehow was able to kick his way to the surface with his good leg and activate his life preserver with his teeth.

Pulled ashore by some North Vietnamese, one of his captors slammed a rifle butt into his right shoulder, shattering it. Another bayoneted him in the abdomen and foot.

The severely injured McCain was then transported to Ho Loa Prison, which was derisively nicknamed the “Hanoi Hilton” by its 500 or so prisoners of war. At first denied medical attention, McCain, who by that time was also suffering from dysentery, was described by one of his fellow POWs, Air Force Major George “Bud” Day, as looking “like he absolutely was on the verge of death.” His tale might have ended there, in that squalid setting, had not prison officials learned of his two-admiral lineage. The North Vietnamese, hoping to score a propaganda victory, not only provided him delayed if substandard medical attention – he underwent surgery on his broken leg, but several ligaments were damaged in the process – but offered him early release. Adhering to the military code of “first in, first out,” McCain said he would only accept if every man captured before him was released as well.

McCain’s refusal to take the accelerated release, as well as his steadfast refusal to give interrogators any more information than his name, rank, serial number and date of birth, so infuriated prison officials that they moved him into solitary confinement in March 1968, several months before his father was named commander in chief of all U.S. Pacific forces. Thus began the systematic torture he was to endure beginning in August 1968, during which time his once-dark-brown hair turned snowy white and his body weight dropped alarmingly, the result of being put on a diet of stale bread and thin pumpkin soup. But, he said, the torture ended around October of 1969 and his solitary confinement concluded in March 1970. After the signing of the Paris Peace Accords on Jan. 27, 1973, putting an end to the Vietnam War, McCain was released on March 14, 1973.

He came home with a body so irretrievably broken that he would walk with a limp for the rest of his days, and unable to raise his arms above his shoulders. There would be personal recriminations as well, with McCain, at the point of suicide and after four days of prolonged torture during the worst stretch of his incarceration, agreeing to write a confession of his “crimes” against the North Vietnamese people.

“I felt just terrible about it,” he recalled. “Every man has his breaking point. I had reached mine.”

Perhaps it was the forced signing of that confession that prompted Republican nominee Donald J. Trump, of whom Sen. McCain was not a fan, to take an egregiously distasteful shot at his tormentor from Arizona during an appearance at the Family Leadership Summit in Ames, Iowa, during the 2016 presidential campaign. Asked about McCain’s service to his country while in the Navy, Trump responded, “He’s not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who aren’t captured.”

Although Trump — who never served in the military and received four deferments from 1964 to ’67 — quickly recanted, he was widely criticized by Democrats and Republicans alike for comments so seemingly inappropriate for someone aspiring to become Commander in Chief of all U.S. military forces. While it is not obligatory for a sitting president to have donned a uniform in defense of his country, to have done so would appear to be more beneficial than a deterrent; of the 45 individuals who have held the nation’s highest elected office, 22 saw combat or served in combat zones while another eight served in other capacities.

Although a frequent critic of Trump, McCain considered the late Ronald Reagan his hero and political role model. Thus was McCain paradoxical in many ways, forever, in the words of Winston Churchill, a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. To left-leaning boxing promoter Bob Arum, McCain was a “great American” and “terrific boxing fan” whose politics were a bit too conservative for his own taste, while to Trump backers he was a gadfly who too often strayed left of their preferred right-of-center moorings. He was in his own way that rarest of politicians, true to his own sometimes alterable beliefs, a fighter for the constituents who kept him in office and a steadfast proponent for that most under-represented minority, the boxers with whom he so readily identified.

“There are some issues that need to be tackled simply because it’s the right thing to do,” he once said of his obsession with eliminating or at least minimizing some of the ills linked to professional boxing. “I’m very proud to be involved in the movement to effect some real change in the boxing industry. I believe that boxers are the most exploited of all professional athletes. They come from the lowest rung, and generally are the least educated. They’re the only major sport that’s not unionized.

“I can’t force boxers to invest their money, but I sure think I can prevent them from being exploited by unscrupulous outsiders.”

Perhaps my most enduring memory of Sen. McCain is the one time I had a chance to speak to him, in a brief interview that was more like two fight fans having a chat, despite the fact I was holding a tape recorder. It was Aug. 25, 1998, and the senator and Pennsylvania’s Republican governor, Tom Ridge, were part of a capacity-plus, sweat-soaked crowd of 1,350 at Philadelphia’s Blue Horizon for a sort-of notable event, the final USA Tuesday Night Fights telecast, which ended the cable network’s 17-year run. In the main event, heavyweight novelty attraction Eric “Butterbean” Esch blasted out journeyman Tim Pollard in the first round of a, natch, scheduled four-rounder.

It didn’t take long for the two politicians, who arrived wearing suits and ties, to doff their jackets and ties and to loosen their collars. But they nonetheless appeared to be enjoying themselves immensely; for Sen. McCain especially, this suffocatingly hot night was a chance to let his hair down and indulge his not-so-secret passion.

“It’s my first time here, but I’ve seen the place on television a hundred times,” he said. “I’d heard about the incredible atmosphere and everything I heard is true. This is one of the great, classic places for boxing.”

Rest in peace, Sen. McCain. The symbolic 10-count has sounded and you take your earthly leave having scored a couple of victories on points in the ongoing quest to make things better for fighters and those who care about them.

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Bernard Fernandez

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

Published

12 hours 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

3 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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Argentina’s Fernando Martinez Wins His Rematch with Kazuto Ioka

Published

4 days ago

May 11, 2025

Arne K. Lang

Argentina's-Fernando-Martinez-Wins-His-Rematch-with-Kazuto-Ioka

In an excellent fight climaxed by a furious 12^th round, Argentina’s Fernando Daniel Martinez came off the deck to win his rematch with Kazuto Ioka and retain his piece of the world 115-pound title. The match was staged at Ioka’s familiar stomping grounds, the Ota-City General Gymnasium in Tokyo.

In their first meeting on July 7 of last year in Tokyo, Martinez was returned the winner on scores of 117-111, 116-112, and a bizarre 120-108. The rematch was slated for late December, but Martinez took ill a few hours before the weigh-in and the bout was postponed.

The 33-year-old Martinez, who came in sporting a 17-0 (9) record, was a 7-2 favorite to win the sequel, but there were plenty of reasons to favor Ioka, 36, aside from his home field advantage. The first Japanese male fighter to win world titles in four weight classes, Ioka was 3-0 in rematches and his long-time trainer Ismael Salas was on a nice roll. Salas was 2-0 last weekend in Times Square, having handled upset-maker Rolly Romero and Reito Tsutsumi who was making his pro debut.

But the fourth time was not a charm for Ioka (31-4-1) who seemingly pulled the fight out of the fire in round 10 when he pitched the Argentine to the canvas with a pair of left hooks, but then wasn’t able to capitalize on the momentum swing.

Martinez set a fast pace and had Ioka fighting off his back foot for much of the fight. Beginning in round seven, Martinez looked fatigued, but the Argentine was conserving his energy for the championship rounds. In the end, he won the bout on all three cards: 114-113, 116-112, 117-110.

Up next for Fernando Martinez may be a date with fellow unbeaten Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez, the lineal champion at 115. San Antonio’s Rodriguez is a huge favorite to keep his title when he defends against South Africa’s obscure Phumelela Cafu on July 19 in Frisco, Texas.

As for Ioka, had he won today’s rematch, that may have gotten him over the hump in so far as making it into the International Boxing Hall of Fame. True, winning titles in four weight classes is no great shakes when the bookends are only 10 pounds apart, but Ioka is still a worthy candidate.

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