Elite Trainer Jesse Reid Has Schooled Some of Boxing’s Most Mercurial Champions

Published

3 years ago

September 11, 2022

Elite Trainer Jesse Reid Has Schooled Some of Boxing’s Most Mercurial Champions

In olden days, the boxing coach of an athletic club was invariably called a professor. To take but one example, the man that taught James J. Corbett the rudiments of boxing at San Francisco’s Olympic Athletic Club, Walter Watson, was almost always referenced as Professor Walter Watson.

At Tru Nevins’ DLX boxing gym in Las Vegas, there are two professors in residence. Drop in any afternoon and you will most likely find Kenny Adams and Jesse Reid on the premises, each there to pass on his knowledge to the young men (and young women) that walk in the door, many of whom are too young to drive. Adams and Reid are both now in their early eighties and each can boast of having trained more than two dozen world title-holders.

Jesse Reid, the subject of this story, was born in 1942 in East Los Angeles when that densely populated census tract wasn’t yet thoroughly Hispanic. Sicilian on his mother’s side, Reid played football in high school and at Cal State LA (then called Los Angeles State) before joining the Navy where he first laced on a pair of boxing gloves. In 1968, he was an alternate on the U.S. Olympic boxing team representing the Alameda (CA) Naval Base. In those days, the bulk of America’s top amateur boxers were members of the Armed Forces.

Reid had a brief pro career, finishing 5-1-2. His final bout with fellow unbeaten Rudy Robles was the headline attraction of a 1971 show at the Olympic Auditorium. Robles, a future world title challenger who lasted 15 rounds with Rodrigo Valdez, won a lopsided decision.

Reid’s manager Jackie McCoy who hung his hat at LA’s Hoover Street Gym could see that Reid had a dim future as a pro boxer but saw something in Reid that suggested to him that Reid would make a fine trainer. McCoy had recently acquired the contract of Guadalajara lightweight Rodolfo Gonzalez and Reid started working with him.

On Nov. 10, 1972, Gonzalez challenged WBC 135-pound champion Chango Carmona at the LA Sports Arena. Carmona had won the belt from another Jackie McCoy fighter, Mando Ramos, and would enter the ring a 3/1 favorite. In a major surprise, Gonzalez not only de-throned Carmona but in a dominant fashion, winning virtually every round until Carmona was pulled out after the 12^th frame.

Jesse Reid had his first champion.

Reid’s work caught the attention of Billy Baxter, a high-stakes gambler who had become smitten with boxing after acquiring the contract of Las Vegas super welterweight Rocky Mosley Jr, a parcel he purportedly won in a poker game. Baxter subsequently purchased the contract of Bruce Curry from Fort Worth, Texas promoter Dave Gorman.

With Reid in his corner, Curry, the half-brother of the brilliant Donald Curry, won the WBC world super lightweight title in 1983 and made two successful defenses before losing the belt to Billy Costello. But what seemed like a healthy relationship turned toxic in a hurry.

Curry was showing signs of paranoia before his match with Costello and the defeat preyed on his mind. On the afternoon of Feb. 3, 1984, five days after losing his title to Costello, Curry confronted Reid at the old Golden Gloves gym in downtown Las Vegas and started punching him. Reid retaliated and opened an old cut between Curry’s eyes. The boxer then ran to his car and returned with a handgun, firing a bullet through the front door of the gym. Reid had the presence of mind to have locked it and was out of harm’s way.

At Reid’s recommendation, Curry was released without bail with the proviso that he return to Fort Worth and seek psychological help. “Bruce went through a lot growing up,” says Reid, looking back. “I didn’t want him to go to prison, because I knew that someone would kill him in there.”

Reid was then involved with Roger Mayweather who had signed with Baxter coming out of the amateur ranks. A multi-belt champion, Mayweather won his first world title in his fifteenth pro bout, unseating Puerto Rican veteran Samuel Serrano in San Juan. Roger would go on to train his famous nephew, applying some of the principles that Jesse Reid had taught him.

The next future champions that Reid helped develop – middleweight Frank Tate, featherweight Calvin Grove, and the Canizales brothers, Gaby and Orlando – represented the fertile but short-lived Houston Boxing Association, an entity founded by Josephine Abercrombie, the heiress to a Texas oil fortune.

“Josephine was a wonderful lady,” says Reid, who notes that she sponsored the 1984 U.S. Olympic team that prepared for the LA Games at her 5,000-acre Texas cattle ranch. (Abercrombie, a noted philanthropist, died earlier this year at age 95.)

The under-appreciated Frank Tate won the vacant IBF middleweight title at Caesars Palace in 1987 with a one-sided decision over Michael Olajide. It was a battle between former Olympic gold medalists, both undefeated, and was a particularly gratifying night for Reid as he had worked with Tate from the very onset of Tate’s pro career, not to mention the fact that his guy was a 2/1 underdog. “Winning a world title is always sweeter when your guy upsets the odds,” says Reid.

The younger Canizales brother, Orlando, and Jesse Reid had one of the most successful runs of any boxer-trainer tandem in boxing history. Canizales, who entered the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 2009, holds the bantamweight record for successful title defenses with 15.

“We never had a formal contract,” says Reid. “Orlando was a great guy to work with. A guy with a very high ring IQ and very loyal.”

Reid wasn’t with Lamon Brewster when Brewster won the WBO version of the world heavyweight title with a fifth-round stoppage of Wladimir Klitschko. But Brewster’s performance was lacking in his first title defense – he was lucky to escape with a split decision over unheralded Kali Meehan – and that led him to reach out to Reid who had worked with him in his amateur days.

Brewster brought to Reid what is every boxing trainer’s dream, the opportunity to work with a world heavyweight champion. He made two successful title defenses with Reid in his corner, the first a 52-second blowout of Andrew Golota in Chicago.

The late Erie, Pennsylvania promoter Mike Acri would figure prominently in Reid’s life. Acri was best known as a re-furbisher; as someone adept at taking a high-profile fighter whose best years were behind him and orchestrating a late-career surge.

Hector Camacho had fallen out of favor after one-sided defeats to Julio Cesar Chavez and Felix Trinidad. Acri picked up his contract for peanuts and navigated him into good paying matches with 45-year-old Roberto Duran and 40-year-old Sugar Ray Leonard, preludes to a more lucrative match with Oscar De La Hoya.

The De La Hoya fight didn’t go well (the Macho Man fought a survivor’s fight and lost every round) but with Reid on board, Camacho toppled Duran and Leonard, sending Sugar Ray off into a final retirement with a fifth-round stoppage.

Camacho had the reputation of someone who was difficult to handle. That went double for Johnny Tapia who had Reid and the great Eddie Futch in his corner for what was arguably his biggest fight, a match in Las Vegas with Albuquerque rival Danny Romero with two world title belts at stake. Romero, considered the bigger puncher, went to post the favorite. Tapia outclassed him.

Dealing with Tapia meant dealing with Theresa Tapia, Johnny’s over-protective wife and manager. “One time I showed up at the gym wearing a Roberto Duran tee shirt,” recalls Reid, laughing at the memory. “Theresa didn’t appreciate that and made me buy 25 of her Johnny Tapia tee shirts.”

Mike Acri, the re-furbisher, proved that he could also “move” a good prospect when he took Paul Spadafora under his wing. Spadafora, who was from McKees Rocks, a rough-and-tumble former iron works town on the Ohio River near Pittsburgh, went from being the house fighter at the Mountaineer Racetrack and Casino in West Virginia to the IBF world lightweight champion.

Spadafora was two fights into his title reign when Acri hired Jesse Reid to assist Paul’s longtime trainer Tom Yankello. Five more successful title defenses would follow preceding a 12-round draw with rugged Romanian-Canadian battler Leonard Dorin, the first blemish on Spadafora’s record.

Spadafora, dubbed the “Pittsburgh Kid,” had his demons. Before turning pro, he was shot in the leg by a policeman while riding in a car that was the subject of a police chase. In his most infamous incident, he shot his girlfriend Nadine Russo in the chest at a McKees Rocks gas station. After that alcohol-infused incident, which he doesn’t remember, he was out of the ring for 27 months while serving time in various correctional institutions.

Spadafora reeled off 10 straight wins after returning to the ring, bumping him into a bout with Venezuela’s Johan Perez, a match sanctioned for the interim WBA 140-pound title. Perez won the decision, becoming the first and last man to defeat Paul Spadafora who had one more fight before leaving the ring with a 49-1-1 (19) record.

Spadafora would be arrested twice more after his final fight. The catalysts were disturbances at the home of his mother and at a Pittsburgh-area tavern.

Before his next-to-last fight, there had been talk of Spadafora moving up in weight to challenge Floyd Mayweather. They had shared the ring once previously, a 6-round sparring session at Richard Steele’s North Las Vegas gym.

Jesse Reid remembers how that came about. “Floyd’s father, Floyd Mayweather Sr, came up to me and said, ‘Why don’t you let that paisan of yours spar somebody good for a change?’ Paul felt disrespected and asked me to make it happen.”

Ask Jesse Reid and he will tell you that Spadafora had all the best of it. “I told him to get in Floyd’s grill and concentrate on the body and he brought out the puppy dog in Mayweather.”

Floyd and his dad, needless to say, likely remember things differently. Regardless, talk of a possible fight between Spadafora and Mayweather ceased when Spadafora was upset by Johan Perez.

Jesse Reid has stayed loyal to Spadafora, as has Nadine (a story for another day). Nowadays, you can find Paul and Nadine and their 17-year-old son Geno Spadafora, an amateur boxer, most afternoons at DLX. The erstwhile Pittsburgh Kid, now 46 years old, isn’t merely an observer. He works out ferociously, setting an example for Geno and the other young boxers going through their paces.

“He’s doing great,” says Jesse Reid, the professor of pugilism who may not be done manufacturing champions.

Arne K. Lang’s latest book, titled “George Dixon, Terry McGovern and the Culture of Boxing in America, 1890-1910,” has rolled off the press. Published by McFarland, the book can be ordered directly from the publisher (https://mcfarlandbooks.com/product/clash-of-the-little-giants) or via Amazon.

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“Breadman” Edwards: An Unlikely Boxing Coach with a Panoramic View of the Sport

Published

13 hours ago

May 8, 2025

Arne K. Lang

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Stephen “Breadman” Edwards’ first fighter won a world title. That may be some sort of record.

It’s true. Edwards had never trained a fighter, amateur or pro, before taking on professional novice Julian “J Rock” Williams. On May 11, 2019, Williams wrested the IBF 154-pound world title from Jarrett Hurd. The bout, a lusty skirmish, was in Fairfax, Virginia, near Hurd’s hometown in Maryland, and the previously undefeated Hurd had the crowd in his corner.

In boxing, Stephen Edwards wears two hats. He has a growing reputation as a boxing coach, a hat he will wear on Saturday, May 31, at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas when the two fighters that he currently trains, super middleweight Caleb Plant and middleweight Kyrone Davis, display their wares on a show that will air on Amazon Prime Video. Plant, who needs no introduction, figures to have little trouble with his foe in a match conceived as an appetizer to a showdown with Jermall Charlo. Davis, coming off his career-best win, an upset of previously undefeated Elijah Garcia, is in tough against fast-rising Cuban prospect Yoenli Hernandez, a former world amateur champion.

Edwards’ other hat is that of a journalist. His byline appears at “Boxing Scene” in a column where he answers questions from readers.

It’s an eclectic bag of questions that Breadman addresses, ranging from his thoughts on an upcoming fight to his thoughts on one of the legendary prizefighters of olden days. Boxing fans, more so than fans of any other sport, enjoy hashing over fantasy fights between great fighters of different eras. Breadman is very good at this, which isn’t to suggest that his opinions are gospel, merely that he always has something provocative to add to the discourse. Like all good historians, he recognizes that the best history is revisionist history.

“Fighters are constantly mislabled,” he says. “Everyone talks about Joe Louis’s right hand. But if you study him you see that his left hook is every bit as good as his right hand and it’s more sneaky in terms of shock value when it lands.”

Stephen “Breadman” Edwards was born and raised in Philadelphia. His father died when he was three. His maternal grandfather, a Korean War veteran, filled the void. The man was a big boxing fan and the two would watch the fights together on the family television.

Edwards’ nickname dates to his early teen years when he was one of the best basketball players in his neighborhood. The derivation is the 1975 movie “Cornbread, Earl and Me,” starring Laurence Fishburne in his big screen debut. Future NBA All-Star Jamaal Wilkes, fresh out of UCLA, plays Cornbread, a standout high school basketball player who is mistakenly murdered by the police.

Coming out of high school, Breadman had to choose between an academic scholarship at Temple or an athletic scholarship at nearby Lincoln University. He chose the former, intending to major in criminal justice, but didn’t stay in college long. What followed were a succession of jobs including a stint as a city bus driver. To stay fit, he took to working out at the James Shuler Memorial Gym where he sparred with some of the regulars, but he never boxed competitively.

Over the years, Philadelphia has harbored some great boxing coaches. Among those of recent vintage, the names George Benton, Bouie Fisher, Nazeem Richardson, and Bozy Ennis come quickly to mind. Breadman names Richardson and West Coast trainer Virgil Hunter as the men that have influenced him the most.

We are all a product of our times, so it’s no surprise that the best decade of boxing, in Breadman’s estimation, was the 1980s. This was the era of the “Four Kings” with Sugar Ray Leonard arguably standing tallest.

Breadman was a big fan of Leonard and of Leonard’s three-time rival Roberto Duran. “I once purchased a DVD that had all of Roberto Duran’s title defenses on it,” says Edwards. “This was a back before the days of YouTube.”

But Edwards’ interest in the sport goes back much deeper than the 1980s. He recently weighed in on the “Pittsburgh Windmill” Harry Greb whose legend has grown in recent years to the point that some have come to place him above Sugar Ray Robinson on the list of the greatest of all time.

“Greb was a great fighter with a terrific resume, of that there is no doubt,” says Breadman, “but there is no video of him and no one alive ever saw him fight, so where does this train of thought come from?”

Edwards notes that in Harry Greb’s heyday, he wasn’t talked about in the papers as the best pound-for-pound fighter in the sport. The boxing writers were partial to Benny Leonard who drew comparisons to the venerated Joe Gans.

Among active fighters, Breadman reserves his highest praise for Terence Crawford. “Body punching is a lost art,” he once wrote. “[Crawford] is a great body puncher who starts his knockouts with body punches, but those punches are so subtle they are not fully appreciated.”

If the opening line holds up, Crawford will enter the ring as the underdog when he opposes Canelo Alvarez in September. Crawford, who will enter the ring a few weeks shy of his 38^th birthday, is actually the older fighter, older than Canelo by almost three full years (it doesn’t seem that way since the Mexican redhead has been in the public eye so much longer), and will theoretically be rusty as 13 months will have elapsed since his most recent fight.

Breadman discounts those variables. “Terence is older,” he says, “but has less wear and tear and never looks rusty after a long layoff.” That Crawford will win he has no doubt, an opinion he tweaked after Canelo’s performance against William Scull: “Canelo’s legs are not the same. Bud may even stop him now.”

Edwards has been with Caleb Plant for Plant’s last three fights. Their first collaboration produced a Knockout of the Year candidate. With one ferocious left hook, Plant sent Anthony Dirrell to dreamland. What followed were a 12-round setback to David Benavidez and a ninth-round stoppage of Trevor McCumby.

Breadman keeps a hectic schedule. From Monday through Friday, he’s at the DLX Gym in Las Vegas coaching Caleb Plant and Kyrone Davis. On weekends, he’s back in Philadelphia, checking in on his investment properties and, of greater importance, watching his kids play sports. His 14-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son are standout all-around athletes.

On those long flights, he has plenty of time to turn on his laptop and stream old fights or perhaps work on his next article. That’s assuming he can stay awake.

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Arne’s Almanac: The Good, the Bad, and the (Mostly) Ugly; a Weekend Boxing Recap and More

Published

3 days ago

May 6, 2025

Arne K. Lang

Arne's-Almanac-The-Good-the-Bad-and-the-(mostly)-Ugly-A-Weeend-Boxing-Recap-and-More

Arne’s Almanac: The Good, the Bad, and the (Mostly) Ugly; a Weekend Boxing Recap and More

It’s old news now, but on back-to-back nights on the first weekend of May, there were three fights that finished in the top six snoozefests ever as measured by punch activity. That’s according to CompuBox which has been around for 40 years.

In Times Square, the boxing match between Devin Haney and Jose Carlos Ramirez had the fifth-fewest number of punches thrown, but the main event, Ryan Garcia vs. Rolly Romero, was even more of a snoozefest, landing in third place on this ignoble list.

Those standings would be revised the next night – knocked down a peg when Canelo Alvarez and William Scull combined to throw a historically low 445 punches in their match in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, 152 by the victorious Canelo who at least pressed the action, unlike Scull (pictured) whose effort reminded this reporter of “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” – no, not the movie starring Paul Newman, just the title.

CompuBox numbers, it says here, are best understood as approximations, but no amount of rejiggering can alter the fact that these three fights were stinkers. Making matters worse, these were pay-per-views. If one had bundled the two events, rather than buying each separately, one would have been out $90 bucks.

****

Thankfully, the Sunday card on ESPN from Las Vegas was redemptive. It was just what the sport needed at this moment – entertaining fights to expunge some of the bad odor. In the main go, Naoya Inoue showed why he trails only Shohei Ohtani as the most revered athlete in Japan.

Throughout history, the baby-faced assassin has been a boxing promoter’s dream. It’s no coincidence that down through the ages the most common nickname for a fighter – and by an overwhelming margin — is “Kid.”

And that partly explains Naoya Inoue’s charisma. The guy is 32 years old, but here in America he could pass for 17.

Joey Archer

Joey Archer, who passed away last week at age 87 in Rensselaer, New York, was one of the last links to an era of boxing identified with the nationally televised Friday Night Fights at Madison Square Garden.

Joey Archer

Archer made his debut as an MSG headliner on Feb. 4, 1961, and had 12 more fights at the iconic mid-Manhattan sock palace over the next six years. The final two were world title fights with defending middleweight champion Emile Griffith.

Archer etched his name in the history books in November of 1965 in Pittsburgh where he won a comfortable 10-round decision over Sugar Ray Robinson, sending the greatest fighter of all time into retirement. (At age 45, Robinson was then far past his peak.)

Born and raised in the Bronx, Joey Archer was a cutie; a clever counter-puncher recognized for his defense and ultimately for his granite chin. His style was embedded in his DNA and reinforced by his mentors.

Early in his career, Archer was domiciled in Houston where he was handled by veteran trainer Bill Gore who was then working with world lightweight champion Joe Brown. Gore would ride into the Hall of Fame on the coattails of his most famous fighter, “Will-o’-the Wisp” Willie Pep. If Joey Archer had any thoughts of becoming a banger, Bill Gore would have disabused him of that notion.

In all honesty, Archer’s style would have been box office poison if he had been black. It helped immensely that he was a native New Yorker of Irish stock, albeit the Irish angle didn’t have as much pull as it had several decades earlier. But that observation may not be fair to Archer who was bypassed twice for world title fights after upsetting Hurricane Carter and Dick Tiger.

When he finally caught up with Emile Griffith, the former hat maker wasn’t quite the fighter he had been a few years earlier but Griffith, a two-time Fighter of the Year by The Ring magazine and the BWAA and a future first ballot Hall of Famer, was still a hard nut to crack.

Archer went 30 rounds with Griffith, losing two relatively tight decisions and then, although not quite 30 years old, called it quits. He finished 45-4 with 8 KOs and was reportedly never knocked down, yet alone stopped, while answering the bell for 365 rounds. In retirement, he ran two popular taverns with his older brother Jimmy Archer, a former boxer who was Joey’s trainer and manager late in Joey’s career.

May he rest in peace.

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Bombs Away in Las Vegas where Inoue and Espinoza Scored Smashing Triumphs

Published

4 days ago

May 4, 2025

David A. Avila

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Japan’s Naoya “Monster” Inoue banged it out with Mexico’s Ramon Cardenas, survived an early knockdown and pounded out a stoppage win to retain the undisputed super bantamweight world championship on Sunday.

Japan and Mexico delivered for boxing fans again after American stars failed in back-to-back days.

“By watching tonight’s fight, everyone is well aware that I like to brawl,” Inoue said.

Inoue (30-0, 27 KOs), and Cardenas (26-2, 14 KOs) and his wicked left hook, showed the world and 8,474 fans at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas that prizefighting is about punching, not running.

After massive exposure for three days of fights that began in New York City, then moved to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia and then to Nevada, it was the casino capital of the world that delivered what most boxing fans appreciate- pure unadulterated action fights.

Monster Inoue immediately went to work as soon as the opening bell rang with a consistent attack on Cardenas, who very few people knew anything about.

One thing promised by Cardenas’ trainer Joel Diaz was that his fighter “can crack.”

Cardenas proved his trainer’s words truthful when he caught Inoue after a short violent exchange with a short left hook and down went the Japanese champion on his back. The crowd was shocked to its toes.

“I was very surprised,” said Inoue about getting dropped. ““In the first round, I felt I had good distance. It got loose in the second round. From then on, I made sure to not take that punch again.”

Inoue had no trouble getting up, but he did have trouble avoiding some of Cardenas massive blows delivered with evil intentions. Though Inoue did not go down again, a look of total astonishment blanketed his face.

A real fight was happening.

Cardenas, who resembles actor Andy Garcia, was never overly aggressive but kept that left hook of his cocked and ready to launch whenever he saw the moment. There were many moments against the hyper-aggressive Inoue.

Both fighters pack power and both looked to find the right moment. But after Inoue was knocked down by the left hook counter, he discovered a way to eliminate that weapon from Cardenas. Still, the Texas-based fighter had a strong right too.

In the sixth round Inoue opened up with one of his lightning combinations responsible for 10 consecutive knockout wins. Cardenas backed against the ropes and Inoue blasted away with blow after blow. Then suddenly, Cardenas turned Inoue around and had him on the ropes as the Mexican fighter unloaded nasty combinations to the body and head. Fans roared their approval.

“I dreamed about fighting in front of thousands of people in Las Vegas,” said Cardenas. “So, I came to give everything.”

Inoue looked a little surprised and had a slight Mona Lisa grin across his face. In the seventh round, the Japanese four-division world champion seemed ready to attack again full force and launched into the round guns blazing. Cardenas tried to catch Inoue again with counter left hooks but Inoue’s combos rained like deadly hail. Four consecutive rights by Inoue blasted Cardenas almost through the ropes. The referee Tom Taylor ruled it a knockdown. Cardenas beat the count and survived the round.

In the eighth round Inoue looked eager to attack and at the bell launched across the ring and unloaded more blows on Cardenas. A barrage of 14 unanswered blows forced the referee to stop the fight at 45 seconds of round eight for a technical knockout win.

“I knew he was tough,” said Inoue. “Boxing is not that easy.”

Espinoza Wins

WBO featherweight titlist Rafael Espinosa (27-0, 23 KOs) uppercut his way to a knockout win over Edward Vazquez (17-3, 4 KOs) in the seventh round.

“I wanted to fight a game fighter to show what I am capable,” said Espinoza.

Espinosa used the leverage of his six-foot, one-inch height to slice uppercuts under the guard of Vazquez. And when the tall Mexican from Guadalajara targeted the body, it was then that the Texas fighter began to wilt. But he never surrendered.

Though he connected against Espinoza in every round, he was not able to slow down the taller fighter and that allowed the Mexican fighter to unleash a 10-punch barrage including four consecutive uppercuts. The referee stopped the fight at 1:47 of the seventh round.

It was Espinoza’s third title defense.

Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank

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