Remembering Ill-Fated Big John Tate, Tennessee’s Only World Heavyweight Champion

Published

5 years ago

February 10, 2020

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The biggest fight on this week’s docket takes place this Saturday in Nashville, Tennessee, where Caleb Plant defends his IBF world super middleweight title against Germany’s Vincent Feigenbutz. It’s a homecoming for Plant who was born in Nashville and raised in nearby Ashland City, which is no city at all but a small town on the northern bank of the Cumberland River.

Caleb Plant is potentially the best fighter ever from the Volunteer State, unless one chooses to include Thomas Hearns who was born in Tennessee near Memphis, but moved with his parents to Detroit at the age of five and would always be identified with the Motor City.

Tennessee, however, did spawn one fighter who went on to win a version of the world heavyweight title. Big John Tate was actually born across the Tennessee line in West Memphis, Arkansas, but he learned to box in Knoxville which became his permanent home.

The rise of Big John Tate reads like something forged by a Hollywood screenwriter. A fifth-grade dropout who left school without knowing how to read or write, Tate used boxing as his ticket to escape from a world of poverty and dead-end jobs, earning more than a million dollars in purse money well before he was 30 years old.

In the hands of a Hollywood screenwriter, his saga would have likely had a happy ending. But in the real world of boxing, happy endings are the exception, and the sad saga of Big John Tate stands as yet another cautionary tale.

Tate’s Svengali was Ace Miller, a reformed pool hustler turned boxing gym operator, trainer and manager. Under Miller’s tutelage, Tate had a brief but productive amateur career, defeating such notables as Michael Dokes, Greg Page and Tony Tubbs en route to a berth on the U.S. Olympic team. At the 1976 Games in Montreal, he advanced to the semis where he was knocked out by the legendary Cuban fighter Teofilo Stevenson.

Standing six-foot-four, Tate was a big heavyweight for his era, bigger than George Foreman, the ex-Olympian to whom he was often compared. He carried 240 pounds for his Oct. 20, 1979 match with Gerrie Coetzee at South Africa’s national rugby stadium in Pretoria. At stake was the WBA world heavyweight title vacated by Muhammad Ali who had announced his retirement after avenging his loss to Leon Spinks.

The battle between Tate (19-0) and Coetzee (22-0) was historic, the first integrated sporting event in the land of apartheid. The crowd, overwhelmingly white and pro-Coetzee, was enormous. Estimates ran as high as 86,000 and that presumably didn’t include the armed militia, 2,000 strong, or the 100 attack dogs deployed to provide security.

Coetzee landed the first meaningful punch of the fight, buckling Tate’s knees with a right to the jaw in the third round, but Tate gradually wore him down and won a unanimous decision.

Bob Arum, Big John’s promoter, thought it would be cool for Tate to make his first defense in his adopted hometown of Knoxville. Mike Weaver, a bodybuilder who owned a 21-9 record and had been stopped five times, was brought in as the opponent. Arum staged the fight at the basketball arena on the campus of the University of Tennessee. The match aired in prime time on ABC where it was conjoined with matches at Caesars Palace in the slot reserved in the fall for Monday Night Football.

If Arum ever gets around to finishing his memoir, the Tate-Weaver fight will occupy a prominent place in it. As Arum has related in bull sessions with reporters, he was entrusted with the trophy that the city of Knoxville had made to present to John Tate at the conclusion of the fight. It was tucked under the ring apron for safekeeping and when he went to retrieve it as the heretofore uneventful 15-round contest was entering the final minute, he heard a large roar from the crowd. Looking up, he saw Tate lying face first on the canvas, out cold. Trailing on all three cards, Mike Weaver had pulled the fight out of the fire with a short but ferocious left hook.

Tate’s heavyweight title reign was over inside of six months, a bitter pill for Arum who, in the words of Michael Katz, had touted Big John as the greatest thing to come out of Tennessee since sippin’ whiskey.

Tate was back in action in 11 weeks, fighting in the chief undercard bout of the mega-fight between Sugar Ray Leonard and Roberto Duran in Montreal, where he was matched against an up-and-comer from Halifax, Nova Scotia, Trevor Berbick. And disaster struck once again.

In round nine, with the fight up for grabs, Tate turned his back on Berbick after absorbing a punch and was hit with two rabbit punches, the second of which knocked him half-way through the ropes. His legs quivered as he was counted out and he would need assistance to navigate the stairs as he left the ring. Berbick could have been disqualified, but it went into the books as a loss by KO for Big John.

John Tate would never again appear in a high-profile fight. He had 14 more bouts, nine in Tennessee, leading into his farewell fight in London with British journeyman Noel Quarles who was given the decision in a close 10-round fight. According to Ace Miller, John was “financially well-protected” when he returned to the civilian world because of various annuities that had been purchased for him.

If you know the history of boxing, you can guess where this story is heading. In the ensuing years, Tate battled a cocaine addiction, lost all his property to creditors, was arrested twice, once for petty theft and once for assault, and was in and out of jail on probation violations. On April 9, 1998, he died in Knoxville when he lost control of his pick-up truck on the entrance ramp to an interstate highway. The truck hit a utility pole and flipped over. The accident may have been caused by a sudden brain aneurism – Tate had been diagnosed with a brain tumor – but the autopsy revealed that he had cocaine in his system. Big John Tate, former U.S. Olympian, former world heavyweight champion, was 43 years old.

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Caleb Plant’s match with Vincent Feigenbutz is the biggest fight ever in Nashville and the biggest fight in Tennessee since Lennox Lewis fought Mike Tyson in Memphis in 2002. Feigenbutz, on paper, doesn’t punch hard enough to do what Mike Weaver did to John Tate, but Feigenbutz, who turned pro in 2011 at age 16, is a solid technician who may well make things a little dicey for the hometown hero. And then, when his career has finally run its course, the pressure will be on Caleb Plant to make a smooth transition into the life of an ex-boxer so that his story, unlike that of poor John Tate, is a story with a happy ending.

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Arne K. Lang

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HITS and MISSES from Another Weekend on the Boxing Beat

Gabriela Fundora KOs Marilyn Badillo and Perez Upsets Conwell in Oceanside

Published

7 hours ago

April 20, 2025

David A. Avila

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It was just a numbers game for Gabriela Fundora and despite Mexico’s Marilyn Badillo’s elusive tactics it took the champion one punch to end the fight and retain her undisputed flyweight world title by knockout on Saturday.

Will it be her last flyweight defense?

Though Fundora (16-0, 8 KOs) fired dozens of misses, a single punch found Badillo (19-1-1, 3 KOs) and ended her undefeated career and first attempt at a world title at the Frontwave Arena in Oceanside, California.

Fundora, however, proves unbeatable at flyweight.

The champion entered the arena as the headliner for the Golden Boy Promotion show and stepped through the ropes with every physical advantage possible, including power.

Mexico’s Badillo was a midget compared to Fundora but proved to be as elusive as a butterfly in a menagerie for the first six rounds. As the six-inch taller Fundora connected on one punch for every dozen thrown, that single punch was a deadly reminder.

Badillo tried ducking low and slipping to the left while countering with slashing uppercuts, she found little success. She did find the body a solid target but the blows proved to be useless. And when Badillo clinched, that proved more erroneous as Fundora belted her rapidly during the tie-ups.

“She was kind of doing her ducking thing,” said Fundora describing Badillo’s defensive tactics. “I just put the pressure on. It was just like a train. We didn’t give her that break.”

The Mexican fighter tried valiantly with various maneuvers. None proved even slightly successful. Fundora remained poised and under control as she stalked the challenger.

In the seventh round Badillo seemed to take a stand and try to slug it out with Fundora. She quickly was lit up by rapid left crosses and down she went at 1:44 of the seventh round. The Mexican fighter’s corner wisely waved off the fight and referee Rudy Barragan stopped the fight and held the dazed Badillo upright.

Once again Fundora remained champion by knockout. The only question now is will she move up to super flyweight or bantamweight to challenge the bigger girls.

Perez Beats Conwell.

Mexico’s Jorge “Chino” Perez (33-4, 26 KOs) upset Charles Conwell (21-1, 15 KOs) to win by split decision after 12 rounds in their super welterweight showdown.

It was a match that paired two hard-hitting fighters whose ledgers brimmed with knockouts, but neither was able to score a knockdown against each other.

Neither fighter moved backward. It was full steam ahead with Conwell proving successful to the body and head with left hooks and Perez connecting with rights to the head and body. It was difficult to differentiate the winner.

Though Conwell seemed to be the superior defensive fighter and more accurate, two judges preferred Perez’s busier style. They gave the fight to Perez by 115-113 scores with the dissenter favoring Conwell by the same margin.

It was Conwell’s first pro loss. Maybe it will open doors for more opportunities.

Other Bouts

Tristan Kalkreuth (15-1) managed to pass a serious heat check by unanimous decision against former contender Felix Valera (24-8) after a 10-round back-and-forth heavyweight fight.

It was very close.

Kalkreuth is one of those fighters that possess all the physical tools including youth and size but never seems to be able to show it. Once again he edged past another foe but at least this time he faced an experienced fighter in Valera.

Valera had his moments especially in the middle of the 10-round fight but slowed down during the last three rounds.

One major asset for Kalkreuth was his chin. He got caught but still motored past the clever Valera. After 10 rounds two judges saw it 99-91 and one other judge 97-93 all for Kalkreuth.

Highly-rated prospect Ruslan Abdullaev (2-0) blasted past dangerous Jino Rodrigo (13- 5-2) in an eight round super lightweight fight. He nearly stopped the very tough Rodrigo in the last two rounds and won by unanimous decision.

Abdullaev is trained by Joel and Antonio Diaz in Indio.

Bakersfield prospect Joel Iriarte (7-0, 7 KOs) needed only 1:44 to knock out Puerto Rico’s Marcos Jimenez (25-12) in a welterweight bout.

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‘Krusher’ Kovalev Exits on a Winning Note: TKOs Artur Mann in his ‘Farewell Fight’

Published

1 day ago

April 19, 2025

Arne K. Lang

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At his peak, former three-time world light heavyweight champion Sergey “Krusher” Kovalev ranked high on everyone’s pound-for-pound list. Now 42 years old – he turned 42 earlier this month – Kovalev has been largely inactive in recent years, but last night he returned to the ring in his hometown of Chelyabinsk, Russia, and rose to the occasion in what was billed as his farewell fight, stopping Artur Mann in the seventh frame.

Kovalev hit his peak during his first run as a world title-holder. He was 30-0-1 (26 KOs) entering first match with Andre Ward, a mark that included a 9-0 mark in world title fights. The only blemish on his record was a draw that could have been ruled a no-contest (journeyman Grover Young was unfit to continue after Kovalev knocked down in the second round what with was deemed an illegal rabbit punch). Among those nine wins were two stoppages of dangerous Haitian-Canadian campaigner Jean Pascal and a 12-round shutout over Bernard Hopkins.

Kovalev’s stature was not diminished by his loss to the undefeated Ward. All three judges had it 114-113, but the general feeling among the ringside press was that Sergey nicked it.

The rematch was also somewhat controversial. Referee Tony Weeks, who halted the match in the eighth stanza with Kovalev sitting on the lower strand of ropes, was accused of letting Ward get away with a series of low blows, including the first punch of a three-punch series of body shots that culminated in the stoppage. Sergey was wobbled by a punch to the head earlier in the round and was showing signs of fatigue, but he was still in the fight. Respected judge Steve Weisfeld had him up by three points through the completed rounds.

Sergey Kovalev was never the same after his second loss to Andre Ward, albeit he recaptured a piece of the 175-pound title twice, demolishing Vyacheslav Shabranskyy for the vacant WBO belt after Ward announced his retirement and then avenging a loss to Eleider Alvarez (TKO by 7) with a comprehensive win on points in their rematch.

Kovalev’s days as a title-holder ended on Nov. 2, 2019 when Canelo Alvarez, moving up two weight classes to pursue a title in a fourth weight division, stopped him in the 11^th round, terminating what had been a relatively even fight with a hellacious left-right combination that left Krusher so discombobulated that a count was superfluous.

That fight went head-to-head with a UFC fight in New York City. DAZN, to their everlasting discredit, opted to delay the start of Canelo-Kovalev until the main event of the UFC fight was finished. The delay lasted more than an hour and Kovalev would say that he lost his psychological edge during the wait.

Kovalev had two fights in the cruiserweight class between his setback to Canelo and last night’s presumptive swan song. He outpointed Tervel Pulev in Los Angeles and lost a 10-round decision to unheralded Robin Sirwan Safar in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Artur Mann, a former world title challenger – he was stopped in three rounds by Mairis Briedis in 2021 when Briedis was recognized as the top cruiserweight in the world – was unexceptional, but the 34-year-old German, born in Kazakhstan, wasn’t chopped liver either, and Kovalev’s stoppage of him will redound well to the Russian when he becomes eligible for the Boxing Hall of Fame.

Krusher almost ended the fight in the second round. He knocked Mann down hard with a short left hand and seemingly scored another knockdown before the round was over (but it was ruled a slip). Mann barely survived the round.

In the next round, a punch left Mann with a bad cut on his right eyelid, but the German came to fight and rounds three, four and five were competitive.

Kovalev had a good sixth round although there were indications that he was tiring. But in the seventh he got a second wind and unleashed a right-left combination that rolled back the clock to the days when he was one of the sport’s most feared punchers. Mann went down hard and as he staggered to his feet, his corner signaled that the fight should be stopped and the referee complied. The official time was 0:49 of round seven. It was the 30^th KO for Kovalev who advanced his record to 36-5-1.

Addendum: History informs us that Farewell Fights have a habit of becoming redundant, by which we mean that boxers often get the itch to fight again after calling it quits. Have we seen the last of Sergey “Krusher” Kovalev? We woudn’t bet on it.

The complete Kovalev-Mann fight card was live-streamed on the Boxing News youtube channel.

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Avila Perspective, Chap. 322: Super Welterweight Week in SoCal

Published

2 days ago

April 18, 2025

David A. Avila

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Two below-the-radar super welterweight stars show off their skills this weekend from different parts of Southern California.

One in particular, Charles Conwell, co-headlines a show in Oceanside against a hard-hitting Mexican while another super welter star Sadriddin Akhmedov faces another Mexican hitter in Commerce.

Take your pick.

The super welterweight division is loaded with talent at the moment. If Terence Crawford remained in the division he would be at the top of the class, but he is moving up several weight divisions.

Conwell (21-0, 16 KOs) faces Jorge Garcia Perez (32-4, 26 KOs) a tall knockout puncher from Los Mochis at the Frontwave Arena in Oceanside, Calif. on Saturday April 19. DAZN will stream the Golden Boy Promotions card that also features undisputed flyweight champion Gabriela Fundora. We’ll get to her later.

Conwell might be the best super welterweight out there aside from the big dogs like Vergil Ortiz, Serhii Bohachuk and Sebastian Fundora.

If you are not familiar with Conwell he comes from Cleveland, Ohio and is one of those fighters that other fighters know about. He is good.

He has the James “Lights Out” Toney kind of in-your-face-style where he anchors down and slowly deciphers the opponent’s tools and then takes them away piece by piece. Usually it’s systematic destruction. The kind you see when a skyscraper goes down floor by floor until it’s smoking rubble.

During the Covid days Conwell fought two highly touted undefeated super welters in Wendy Toussaint and Madiyar Ashkeyev. He stopped them both and suddenly was the boogie man of the super welterweight division.

Conwell will be facing Mexico’s taller Garcia who likes to trade blows as most Mexican fighters prefer, especially those from Sinaloa. These guys will be firing H bombs early.

Fundora

Co-headlining the Golden Boy card is Gabriela Fundora (15-0, 7 KOs) the undisputed flyweight champion of the world. She has all the belts and Mexico’s Marilyn Badillo (19-0-1, 3 KOs) wants them.

Gabriela Fundora is the sister of Sebastian Fundora who holds the men’s WBC and WBO super welterweight world titles. Both are tall southpaws with power in each hand to protect the belts they accumulated.

Six months ago, Fundora met Argentina’s Gabriela Alaniz in Las Vegas to determine the undisputed flyweight champion. The much shorter Alaniz tried valiantly to scrap with Fundora and ran into a couple of rocket left hands.

Mexico’s Badillo is an undefeated flyweight from Mexico City who has battled against fellow Mexicans for years. She has fought one world champion in Asley Gonzalez the current super flyweight world titlist. They met years ago with Badillo coming out on top.

Does Badillo have the skill to deal with the taller and hard-hitting Fundora?

When a fighter has a six-inch height advantage like Fundora, it is almost impossible to out-maneuver especially in two-minute rounds. Ask Alaniz who was nearly decapitated when she tried.

This will be Badillo’s first pro fight outside of Mexico.

Commerce Casino

Kazakhstan’s Sadriddin Akhmedov (15-0, 13 KOs) is another dangerous punching super welterweight headlining a 360 Promotions card against Mexico’s Elias Espadas (23-6, 16 KOs) on Saturday at the Commerce Casino.

UFC Fight Pass will stream the 360 Promotions card of about eight bouts.

Akhmedov is another Kazakh puncher similar to the great Gennady “GGG” Golovkin who terrorized the middleweight division for a decade. He doesn’t have the same polish or dexterity but doesn’t lack pure punching power.

It’s another test for the super welterweight who is looking to move up the ladder in the very crowded 154-pound weight division. 360 Promotions already has a top contender in Ukraine’s Serhii Bohachuk who nearly defeated Vergil Ortiz a year ago.

Could Bohachuk and Akhmedov fight each other if nothing else materializes?

That’s a question for another day.

Fights to Watch

Sat. DAZN 5 p.m. Charles Conwell (21-0, 16 KOs) vs. Jorge Garcia Perez (32-4, 26 KOs); Gabriela Fundora (15-0) vs Marilyn Badillo (19-0-1).

Sat. UFC Fight Pass 6 p.m. Sadriddin Akhmedov (15-0) vs Elias Espadas (23-6).

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