Featured Articles
The Hauser Report: Crawford, Avanesyan, Spence, and BLK Prime
On December 10, Terence Crawford knocked out David Avanesyan in the sixth round of a fight promoted in Crawford’s hometown of Omaha, Nebraska, by a virtually unknown company called BLK Prime. The promotion was destined from the start to lose millions of dollars and seemed to make no sense from a business point of view. The organizers have a track record of – shall we say – questionable business dealings. And the fight that fans wanted to see was Crawford vs. Errol Spence, not Crawford-Avanesyan.
Let’s dissect the mess.
Crawford is a complete fighter. He can box. He can punch. He transitions seamlessly from orthodox to southpaw and is equally effective from either stance. When he beat Julius Indongo at 140 pounds in 2017, he became the first champion to hold all four major sanctioning body belts in any weight class since 2006. He has been a fixture at or near the top of pound-for-pound lists for years. The only thing missing from his resume (which now shows 39 wins with 30 knockouts in 39 fights) is a signature win over another elite fighter.
Spence has long been the logical opponent for Crawford to fight. But the boxing business isn’t logical. As Carlos Acevedo wrote, “Boxing rarely yields to the wishes of the public. In the real world, fans would be the equivalent of consumers and no company in its right mind would ignore, much less insult, its customer base. Most companies are interested in developing a quality product and maintaining some kind of relationship with their clientele, who have purchasing power behind them. But promoters are impervious to market forces because market forces, for the most part, do not exist in boxing. It hardly matters if a ticket sells, a Nielsen point is produced, a pay-per-view is ordered. All a promoter needs to do is bend the ear of a network executive [or gullible investor], preferably one with little interest in quality control, and – voila! – he is flush. This is the business model to end all business models.”
Spence has consistently put a damper on prospects for Crawford-Spence. âMe and Terence Crawford are on different sides of the street,” Errol said in 2019. “Heâs just signed with ESPN. I donât fight for ESPN. I fight for Showtime or Fox. Terence Crawford has got to come across the street.”
“Thereâs no such thing as âacross the street,” Crawford responded. “Back in the day, you never heard fighters say âacross the street.â What street? This is boxing. Everybody fights everybody.”
Then, this year, Crawford’s contract with Top Rank expired and he became a promotional free agent. It was an ugly parting with Terence suing Top Rank for alleged racial bias and breach of contract. The claim of racial bias seems unfounded and legally frivolous. Not having seen Crawford’s contract with Top Rank and a full accounting with regard to his fights, it’s impossible to voice an opinion with respect to the contract claim.
Regardless, the major impediment to making Crawford-Spence had been removed from the mix. Or so it seemed. The problem was that Premier Boxing Champions impresario Al Haymon [Spence’s de facto manager) continued to take negotiating positions that worked against making the fight.
More specifically, Haymon wanted Crawford to fight Spence on a percentage basis with no minimum guarantee. And according to Crawford, PBC refused to insert a clause in Terence’s contract that would have required financial transparency to ensure that he got an honest accounting.
Remarkably, Crawford was amenable to fighting without a guarantee. That’s how badly he wanted to fight Spence. But the lack of transparency was a sticking point.
“I never heard of a fighter ever taking zero guarantee in a fight,” Terence said in a November 1 Instagram Live session. “That is something thatâs new to me, but thatâs something that I was willing to do to make this fight happen. I told him, âAll right, cool; Iâll take no guarantee. Iâll take the less end of the money. Whatever it is you want, Iâll take it because thatâs how much confidence I got that Iâm gonna beat that man. So even though I knew I was getting f*****, I just wanted a little transparency. I said, âOkay, if Iâm gonna bet on myself, then I want a little transparency.â I wanna know things thatâs gonna affect my check. I wanna see if the numbers add up to what they tellinâ me. Itâs just simple to me. To think that a person would go in a business with a person and this person would tell them, âOh, well, Iâm not gonna tell you how much we really made, but Iâm gonna just give you this. You just gotta trust me.â Come on, now. It donât make no sense.”
Here one might note that asking a fighter of Crawford’s magnitude to fight with no guarantee and without full transparency sounds like Haymon was taking a play out of Don King’s old playbook.
Crawford also maintained that, at one point in the negotiations, two hedge funds offered to pay guaranteed purses of $25 million each to him and Spence but that, in his words, “Al told me straight up, âIâm not letting anybody touch this fight.'”
Maybe the hedge fund money was real. Maybe not. If it had been put in escrow, that wouldn’t have been Crawford and Spence’s problem. Then again, if the money had been put in escrow, Crawford and Spence would have had transparency. They would have known exactly how much money was there to be divided between them.
Bottom line . . . It appears as though Crawford wanted the fight and Team Spence didn’t. “I believe in my abilities and I believe in myself,” Terence said. “Errol Spence, he canât say the same.”
Then the earth shifted. Attorney John Hornewer had been negotiating Crawford-Spence with Haymon and Showtime Sports president Stephen Espinoza on Crawford’s behalf. On October 20, Hornewer got a telephone call from Team Crawford telling him to stop. Later that day, Hornewer learned from news reports that Crawford and David Avanesyan had signed contracts to fight each other on December 10 at CHI Health Center in Omaha.
Avanesyan (Russian-born and now living in England) has beaten some good fighters but not any very good ones. One of his losses came by stoppage at the hands of Egidijus Kavaliauskas (who Crawford knocked out).
Crawford-Avanesyan was funded and streamed by a little-known subscription video-on-demand service called BLK Prime and was also available on traditional outlets. It was publicly stated that Crawford’s contract called for him to receive a $10 million purse with half of that amount having been placed in escrow as of October 20. This could have been an accurate number. More likely, it was an exaggeration for the sake of publicity and ego.
How did the deal come about?
“These people [BLK Prime] came out of the woodwork,” Frank Warren (Avanesyan’s promoter) told this writer. “I have no idea who they are. They contacted us through the fighter. George [Warren’s son and CEO of Queensberry Promotions] and [Queensberry event manager] Andy Ayling put the deal together. And I can assure you; there’s no way in the world that David would be going to the United States unless his money was safeguarded.”
âIt is what it is,” Crawford said after the deal was announced. “Iâm moving forward with my career. I agreed to everything that I needed to agree to get that fight [Crawford-Spence] made. But thereâs only so much I can do. Al told me, âWell, you take this fight or you got nothing.â I donât know like the type of caliber of people that he been dealing with. Like, what do you really expect? You expect me to be disrespected, ran over, stepped on, and just sit there and just take it. Weâre gonna turn up with BLK Prime. We gonna do our thing. They turninâ boxing around, man. All the biggest fights going through them. They the new wave. You wanna fight this guy, you wanna fight this guy. They gonna make it happen.â
Okay . . . So what is BLK Prime? As noted above, it’s a video-on-demand service. As of this writing, it charges $3.99 per month for content exclusive of pay-per-view events. It’s hard to think of a promotional company about which so little is known that appeared on the boxing scene in conjunction with a fight of similar magnitude.
The driving force behind BLK Prime appears to be Desmond Gumbs, who has been on the fringe of the entertainment business for years and is alleged in various internet postings to have left a trail of unpaid creditors in his wake.
Gumbs is also listed as the athletic director and head football coach at Lincoln University – a private school in Oakland. According to Wikipedia, Lincoln is on the U.S. Department of Education’s Federal Student Aid (FSA) List of Institutions on Heightened Cash Monitoring.
“Heightened Cash Monitoring,” Wikipedia explains, “is a step that FSA can take with institutions to provide additional oversight for a number of financial or federal compliance issues, some of which may be serious and others that may be less troublesome. The list notes ‘severe findings’ for Lincoln University.”
In addition, a November 1, 2018, report from an online publication called Record Searchlight ties Gumbs to a motel called Market Street Manor which the Shasta County (California) District Attorney’s office said was purchased in April 2017 by Desmond and Chandler Gumbs through a company called Earl Freddy Invest C LLC.
In a news release, District Attorney Stephanie Bridgett declared, “The Market Street Manor has become a hub of crime and violence in our community and it is a public nuisance. I cannot permit this business to continue violating the law without consequences.â The news release also referenced “deplorable living conditions” in the motel including the allegation that some rooms were “infested with rats, mice and bedbugs” and Bridgett’s claim that “the Gumbsesâ ownership is putting a strain on law enforcement and affecting neighboring businesses.”
A company in the United Kingdom called BLK Prime Limited is registered as a property management business and lists Desmond Gumbs as a director. BLK Prime G LLC is listed by Bizapedia as a California limited-liability entertainment company whose filing status has been “suspended” by the Franchise Tax Board for failure to meet state tax requirements.
These are not good credentials.
Crawford, as noted above, said that his purse for fighting Avanesyan would be $10 million. That was far above market value and considerably more than Terence received for recent fights against Jose Benavidez Jr ($3.5 million), Amir Khan ($4.8 million), Egidijus Kavaliauskas ($4 million), Kell Brook ($3.5 million), and Shawn Porter ($6 million).
âI already got half of my money,” Crawford told Brian Custer several weeks before the bout. “And Iâmma get the other half before I even step in the ring, like a week before or so. That way, I donât have to worry about if they have the money or they donât or have to go through all those hoops on getting paid. My money is already secured.”
Avanesyan’s purse was $550,000 with no option clause should he win. The contract also called for him to receive partial payment had the fight fallen through due to no fault on his part. Avanesyan’s purse was held in escrow by attorney Leon Margules. The final payment to the escrow fund was due on December 5 and was received by Margules on December 9.
Expenses for the promotion, if Crawford had in fact contracted for $10 million, were expected to total close to $12 million. Where would the revenue to cover these costs (or even a $5 million purse for Crawford) come from?
Tickets for the event were priced from $500 down to $50. In a best-case scenario, the promotion could hope for a live gate of $1 million to $2 million. The other substantial revenue stream would come from pay-per-view buys. But Crawford has never been a pay-per-view draw. âHis marketability,” Bob Arum has observed, “didnât measure up to his ability. Terenceâs numbers on PPV have always been dreadful.”
Crawford vs. Shawn Porter generated a dismal 135,000 pay-per-view buys. And that was with two talented “name fighters” competing against one another and ESPN’s marketing muscle behind the promotion. BLK Prime had no marketing platform to build on.
By way of comparison, ESPN’s main Instagram page has 24.2 million followers. BLK Prime’s main Instagram page is credited with 47,000.
Moreover, Crawford-Avanesyan would be airing opposite the Heisman Trophy presentation followed by a Top Rank card featuring Teofimo Lopez on ESPN. Best estimates were that Crawford-Avanesyan would generate well under 50,000 buys.
On November 28, 2022, BLK announced that Crawford-Avanesyan would be distributed on pay-per-view through traditional cable and satellite outlets by Integrated Sports and streamed by BLK Prime and PPV.com for $39.95. Protocol Sports Marketing was chosen to market and distribute worldwide media rights (excluding the United States and Canada).
In an effort to bolster the promotion, 37-year-old Cris Cyborg was added to the card in a four-round lightweight boxing match against Gabrielle Holloway (another MMA fighter who engaged in two boxing matches six years ago and lost both of them).
Todd Grisham was brought onboard to handle the blow-by-blow commentary with Paulie Malignaggi and Antonio Tarver beside him.
On the afternoon of the fight, it was announced that Adrian Broner will face off against Ivan Redkach on BLK Prime in Atlanta on February 18, 2023, with Tevin Farmer vs. Mickey Bey on the undercard. This assumes that Broner isn’t in jail, can make weight (a dubious proposition), and shows up for the fight.
BLK Prime doesn’t have options on Crawford. The widespread assumption is that it lost millions of dollars on Crawford-Avanesyan and would lose millions more on a Broner venture.
And for what? Crawford-Avansyan did next to nothing in terms of getting the BLK Prime app off the ground. Nor did it establish the company as a significant player in boxing. What is the long-term business plan?
CHI Health Center seats 17,000 for boxing. The announced crowd for Crawford-Avanesyan was 14,630. The undercard was undistinguished. The television production suffered from a lack of multiple camera angles. Crawford (a 12-to-1 betting favorite) knocked Avanesyan unconscious with a highlight-reel left-uppercut-right-hook combination in the sixth round.
And a thought in closing . . .
Four decades ago, a man named Ross Fields (who adopted the alias “Harold Smith”) formed a company called Muhammad Ali Professional Sports and, with Ali’s consent, began promoting fights. Smith paid outlandish purses to fighters and MAPS hemorrhaged money until it was revealed that the source of his funding was $21 million ($73 million in today’s dollars) that had been embezzled from the Wells Fargo Bank of California.
BLK Prime’s boxing venture might be on the up-and-up. But it’s worth remembering what Bob Arum said about Harold Smith’s promotional activities way back when.
“I am totally bewildered,” Arum stated, “why anybody would go into boxing ventures for the purpose of losing substantial sums of money. They are paying double and triple what other promoters could afford to pay and remain solvent. How they do it and why is a mystery. Where does the money come from?”
Thomas Hauser’s email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His most recent book â In the Inner Sanctum: Behind the Scenes at Big Fights â was published by the University of Arkansas Press. In 2004, the Boxing Writers Association of America honored Hauser with the Nat Fleischer Award for career excellence in boxing journalism. In 2019, he was selected for boxing’s highest honor – induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.
To comment on this story in the Fight Forum CLICK HERE
Next generation rivals Conor Benn and Chris Eubank Jr. carry on the family legacy of feudal warring in the prize ring on Saturday.
This is huge in British boxing.
Eubank (34-3, 25 KOs) holds the fringe IBO middleweight title but wonât be defending it against the smaller welterweight Benn (23-0, 14 KOs) on Saturday, April 26, at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London. DAZN will stream the Matchroom Boxing card.
This is about family pride.
The parents of Eubank and Benn actually began the feud in the 1990s.
Papa Nigel Benn fought Papa Chris Eubank twice. Losing as a middleweight in November 1990 at Birmingham, England, then fighting to a draw as a super middleweight in October 1993 in Manchester. Both were world title fights.
Eubank was undefeated and won the WBO middleweight world title in 1990 against Nigel Benn by knockout. He defended it three times before moving up and winning the vacant WBO super middleweight title in September 1991. He defended the super middleweight title 14 times before suffering his first pro defeat in March 1995 against Steve Collins.
Benn won the WBO middleweight title in April 1990 against Doug DeWitt and defended it once before losing to Eubank in November 1990. He moved up in weight and took the WBC super middleweight title from Mauro Galvano in Italy by technical knockout in October 1992. He defended the title nine times until losing in March 1996. His last fight was in November 1996, a loss to Steve Collins.
Animosity between the two families continues this weekend in the boxing ring.
Conor Benn, the son of Nigel, has fought mostly as a welterweight but lately has participated in the super welterweight division. He is several inches shorter in height than Eubank but has power and speed. Kind of a British version of Gervonta âTankâ Davis.
“It’s always personal, every opponent I fight is personal. People want to say it’s strictly business, but it’s never business. If someone is trying to put their hands on me, trying to render me unconscious, it’s never business,” said Benn.
This fight was scheduled twice before and cut short twice due to failed PED tests by Benn. The weight limit agreed upon is 160 pounds.
Eubank, a natural middleweight, has exchanged taunts with Benn for years. He recently avenged a loss to Liam Smith with a knockout victory in September 2023.
âThis fight isn’t about size or weight. It’s about skill. It’s about dedication. It’s about expertise and all those areas in which I excel in,â said Eubank. âI have many, many more years of experience over Conor Benn, and that will be the deciding factor of the night.â
Because this fight was postponed twice, the animosity between the two feuding fighters has increased the attention of their fans. Both fighters are anxious to flatten each other.
âHe’s another opponent in my way trying to crush my dreams. trying to take food off my plate and trying to render me unconscious. That’s how I look at him,” said Benn.
Eubank smiles.
âWhether it’s boxing, whether it’s a gun fight. Defense, offense, foot movement, speed, power. I am the superior boxer in each of those departments and so many more – which is why I’m so confident,â he said.
Supporting Bout
Former world champion Liam Smith (33-4-1, 20 KOs) tangles with Irelandâs Aaron McKenna (19-0, 10 KOs) in a middleweight fight set for 12 rounds on the Benn-Eubank undercard in London.
âBeefyâ Smith has long been known as one of the fighting Smith brothers and recently lost to Eubank a year and a half ago. It was only the second time in 38 bouts he had been stopped. Saul âCaneloâ Alvarez did it several years ago.
McKenna is a familiar name in Southern California. The Irish fighter fought numerous times on Golden Boy Promotion cards between 2017 and 2019 before returning to the United Kingdom and his assault on continuing the middleweight division. This is a big step for the tall Irish fighter.
Itâs youth versus experience.
âI’ve been calling for big fights like this for the last two or three years, and it’s a fight I’m really excited for. I plan to make the most of it and make a statement win on Saturday night,â said McKenna, one of two fighting brothers.
Monster in L.A.
Japanâs super star Naoya âMonsterâ Inoue arrived in Los Angeles for last day workouts before his Las Vegas showdown against Ramon Cardenas on Sunday May 4, at T-Mobile Arena. ESPN will televise and stream the Top Rank card.
Itâs been four years since the super bantamweight world champion performed in the US and during that time Naoya (29-0, 26 KOs) gathered world titles in different weight divisions. The Japanese slugger has also gained fame as perhaps the best fighter on the planet. Cardenas is 26-1 with 14 KOs.
Pomona Fights
Super featherweights Mathias Radcliffe (9-0-1) and Ezequiel Flores (6-4) lead a boxing card called âDMG Night of Championsâ on Saturday April 26, at the historic Fox Theater in downtown Pomona, Calif.
Michaela Bracamontes (11-2-1) and Jesus Torres Beltran (8-4-1) will be fighting for a regional WBC super featherweight title. More than eight bouts are scheduled.
Doors open at 6 p.m. For ticket information go to: www.tix.com/dmgnightofchampions
Fights to Watch
Sat. DAZN 9 a.m. Conor Benn (23-0) vs Chris Eubank Jr. (34-3); Liam Smith (33-4-1) vs Aaron McKenna (19-0).
To comment on this story in the Fight Forum CLICK HERE
Floyd Mayweather has Another Phenom and his name is Curmel Moton
In any endeavor, the defining feature of a phenom is his youth. Philadelphia Phillies outfielder Bryce Harper was a phenom. He was on the radar screen of baseballâs most powerful player agents when he was 14 years old.
Curmel Moton, who turns 19 in June, is a phenom. Of all the young boxing stars out there, wrote James Slater in July of last year, âCurmel Moton is the one to get most excited about.â
Moton was born in Salt Lake City, Utah. His father Curtis Moton, a barber by trade, was a big boxing fan and specifically a big fan of Floyd Mayweather Jr. When Curmel was six, Curtis packed up his wife (Curmelâs stepmom) and his son and moved to Las Vegas. Curtis wanted his son to get involved in boxing and there was no better place to develop oneâs latent talents than in Las Vegas where many of the sportâs top practitioners came to train.
Many father-son relationships have been ruined, or at least frayed, by a fatherâs unrealistic expectations for his son, but when it came to boxing, the boy was a natural and he felt right at home in the gym.
The gym the Motons patronized was the Mayweather Boxing Club. Curtis took his son there in hopes of catching the eye of the proprietor. âFloyd would occasionally drop by the gym and I was there so often that he came to recognize me,â says Curmel. What he fails to add is that the trainers there had Floydâs ear. âThis kid is special,â they told him.
It costs a great deal of money for a kid to travel around the country competing in a slew of amateur boxing tournaments. Only a few have the luxury of a sponsor. For the vast majority, fund raisers such as car washes keep the wheels greased.
Floyd Mayweather stepped in with the financial backing needed for the Motons to canvas the country in tournaments. As an amateur, Curmel was — take your pick — 156-7 or 144-6 or 61-3 (the latter figure from boxrec). Regardless, at virtually every tournament at which he appeared, Curmel Moton was the cock of the walk.
Before the pandemic, Floyd Mayweather Jr had a stable of boxers he promoted under the banner of âThe Money Team.â In talking about his boxers, Floyd was understated with one glaring exception â Gervonta âTankâ Davis, now one of boxingâs top earners.
When Floyd took to praising Curmel Moton with the same effusive language, folks stood up and took notice.
Curmel made his pro debut on Sept. 30, 2023, at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on the undercard of the super middleweight title fight between Canelo Alvarez and Jermell Charlo. After stopping his opponent in the opening round, he addressed a flock of reporters in the media room with Floyd standing at his side. âI felt ready,â he said, âI knew I had Floyd behind me. He believes in me. I had the utmost confidence going into the fight. And I went in there and did what I do.â
Floyd ventured the opinion that Curmel was already a better fighter than Leigh Wood, the reigning WBA world featherweight champion who would successfully defend his belt the following week.
Motonâs boxing style has been described as a blend of Floyd Mayweather and Tank Davis. âI grew up watching Floyd, so itâs natural I have some similarities to him,â says Curmel who sparred with Tank in late November of 2021 as Davis was preparing for his match with Isaac âPitbullâ Cruz. Curmell says he did okay. He was then 15 years old and still in school; he dropped out as soon as he reached the age of 16.
Curmel is now 7-0 with six KOs, four coming in the opening round. He pitched an 8-round shutout the only time he was taken the distance. Itâs not yet official, but he returns to the ring on May 31 at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas where Caleb Plant and Jermall Charlo are co-featured in matches conceived as tune-ups for a fall showdown. The fight card will reportedly be free for Amazon Prime Video subscribers.
Curmelâs presumptive opponent is Renny Viamonte, a 28-year-old Las Vegas-based Cuban with a 4-1-1 (2) record. It will be Curmelâs first professional fight with Kofi Jantuah the chief voice in his corner. A two-time world title challenger who began his career in his native Ghana, the 50-year-old Jantuah has worked almost exclusively with amateurs, a recent exception being Mikaela Mayer.
It would seem that the phenom needs a tougher opponent than Viamonte at this stage of his career. However, the match is intriguing in one regard. Viamonte is lanky. Listed at 5-foot-11, he will have a seven-inch height advantage.
Keeping his weight down has already been problematic for Moton. He tipped the scales at 128 Âœ for his most recent fight. His May 31 bout, he says, will be contested at 135 and down the road itâs reasonable to think he will blossom into a welterweight. And with each bump up in weight, his short stature will theoretically be more of a handicap.
For fun, we asked Moton to name the top fighter on his pound-for-pound list. â[Oleksandr] Usyk is number one right now,â he said without hesitation,â great footwork, but guys like Canelo, Crawford, Inoue, and Bivol are right there.â
Itâs notable that there isnât a young gun on that list. Usyk is 38, a year older than Crawford; Inoue is the pup at age 32.
Moton anticipates that his name will appear on pound-for-pound lists within the next two or three years. True, history is replete with examples of phenoms who flamed out early, but we wouldnât bet against it.
To comment on this story in the Fight Forum CLICK HERE
Featured Articles
Arneâs Almanac: The First Boxing Writers Assoc. of America Dinner Was Quite the Shindig
The first annual dinner of the Boxing Writers Association of America was staged on April 25, 1926 in the grand ballroom of New Yorkâs Hotel Astor, an edifice that rivaled the original Waldorf Astoria as the swankiest hotel in the city. Back then, the organization was known as the Boxing Writers Association of Greater New York.
The ballroom was configured to hold 1200 for the banquet which was reportedly oversubscribed. Among those listed as agreeing to attend were the governors of six states (New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, and Maryland) and the mayors of 10 of Americaâs largest cities.
In 1926, radio was in its infancy and the digital age was decades away (and inconceivable). So, every journalist who regularly covered boxing was a newspaper and/or magazine writer, editor, or cartoonist. And at this juncture in American history, there were plenty of outlets for someone who wanted to pursue a career as a sportswriter and had the requisite skills to get hired.
The following papers were represented at the inaugural boxing writersâ dinner:
New York Times
New York News
New York World
New York Sun
New York Journal
New York Post
New York Mirror
New York Telegram
New York Graphic
New York Herald Tribune
Brooklyn Eagle
Brooklyn Times
Brooklyn Standard Union
Brooklyn Citizen
Bronx Home News
This isnât a complete list because a few of these papers, notably the New York World and the New York Journal, had strong afternoon editions that functioned as independent papers. Plus, scribes from both big national wire services (Associated Press and UPI) attended the banquet and there were undoubtedly a smattering of scribes from papers in New Jersey and Connecticut.
Back then, the eventâs organizer Nat Fleischer, sports editor of the New York Telegram and the driving force behind The Ring magazine, had little choice but to limit the journalistic component of the gathering to writers in the New York metropolitan area. There wasnât a ballroom big enough to accommodate a good-sized response if he had extended the welcome to every boxing writer in North America.
The keynote speaker at the inaugural dinner was New Yorkâs charismatic Jazz Age mayor James J. âJimmyâ Walker, architect of the transformative Walker Law of 1920 which ushered in a new era of boxing in the Empire State with a template that would guide reformers in many other jurisdictions.
Prizefighting was then associated with hooligans. In his speech, Mayor Walker promised to rid the sport of their ilk. âBoxing, as you know, is closest to my heart,â said hizzoner. âSo I tell you the police force is behind you against those who would besmirch or injure boxing. Rowdyism doesnât belong in this town or in your game.â (In 1945, Walker would be the recipient of the Edward J. Neil Memorial Award given for meritorious service to the sport. The oldest of the BWAA awards, the previous recipients were all active or former boxers. The award, no longer issued under that title, was named for an Associated Press sportswriter and war correspondent who died from shrapnel wounds covering the Spanish Civil War.)
Another speaker was well-traveled sportswriter Wilbur Wood, then affiliated with the Brooklyn Citizen. He told the assembly that the aim of the organization was two-fold: to help defend the game against its detractors and to promote harmony among the various factions.
Of course, the 1926 dinner wouldnât have been as well-attended without the entertainment. According to press dispatches, Broadway stars and performers from some of the cityâs top nightclubs would be there to regale the attendees. Among the names bandied about were vaudeville superstars Sophie Tucker and Jimmy Durante, the latter of whom would appear with his trio, Durante, (Lou) Clayton, and (Eddie) Jackson.
There was a contraction of New York newspapers during the Great Depression. Although empirical evidence is lacking, the inaugural boxing writers dinner was likely the largest of its kind. Fifteen years later, in 1941, the event drew âmore than 200â according to a news report. There was no mention of entertainment.
In 1950, for the first time, the annual dinner was opened to the public. For $25, a civilian could get a meal and mingle with some of his favorite fighters. Sugar Ray Robinson was the Edward J. Neil Award winner that year, honored for his ring exploits and for donating his purse from the Charlie Fusari fight to the Damon Runyon Cancer Fund.
There was no formal announcement when the Boxing Writers Association of Greater New York was re-christened the Boxing Writers Association of America, but by the late 1940s reporters were referencing the annual event as simply the boxing writers dinner. By then, it had become traditional to hold the annual affair in January, a practice discontinued after 1971.
The winnowing of New Yorkâs newspaper herd plus competing banquets in other parts of the country forced Nat Fleischerâs baby to adapt. And more adaptations will be necessary in the immediate future as the future of the BWAA, as it currently exists, is threatened by new technologies. If the forthcoming BWAA dinner (April 30 at the Edison Ballroom in mid-Manhattan) were restricted to wordsmiths from the traditional print media, the gathering would be too small to cover the nut and the congregants would be drawn disproportionately from the geriatric class.
Some of those adaptations have already started. Last year, Las Vegas resident Sean Zittel, a recent UNLV graduate, had the distinction of becoming the first videographer welcomed into the BWAA. With more and more people getting their news from sound bites, rather than the written word, the videographer serves an important function.
The reporters who conducted interviews with pen and paper have gone the way of the dodo bird and that isnât necessarily a bad thing. A taped interview for a âtalkieâ has more integrity than a story culled from a paper and pen interview because it is unfiltered. Many years ago, some reporters, after interviewing the great Joe Louis, put  words in his mouth that made him seem like a dullard, words consistent with the Sambo stereotype. In other instances, the language of some athletes was reconstructed to the point where the reader would think the athlete had a second job as an English professor.
The content created by videographers is free from that bias. More of them will inevitably join the BWAA and similar organizations in the future.
Photo: Nat Fleischer is flanked by Sugar Ray Robinson and Tony Zale at the 1947 boxing writers dinner.
Boxing Odds and Ends: The Wacky and Sad World of Livingstone Bramble and More
Avila Perspective, Chap. 319: Rematches in Las Vegas, Cancun and More
Ringside at the Fontainebleau where Mikaela Mayer Won her Rematch with Sandy Ryan
William Zepeda Edges Past Tevin Farmer in Cancun; Improves to 34-0
History has Shortchanged Freddie Dawson, One of the Best Boxers of his Era
Avila Perspective, Chap. 320: Womenâs Boxing Hall of Fame, Heavyweights and More
Results and Recaps from Las Vegas where Richard Torrez Jr Mauled Guido Vianello
Filip Hrgovic Defeats Joe Joyce in Manchester
Weekend Recap and More with the Accent of Heavyweights
Remembering Hall of Fame Boxing Trainer Kenny Adams
Jaron âBootsâ Ennis Wins Welterweight Showdown in Atlantic City
Avila Perspective Chap 320: Boots Ennis and Stanionis
Boxing Notes and Nuggets from Thomas Hauser
Dzmitry Asanau Flummoxes Francesco Patera on a Ho-Hum Card in Montreal
Mekhrubon Sanginov, whose Heroism Nearly Proved Fatal, Returns on Saturday
TSS Salutes Thomas Hauser and his Bernie Award Cohorts
Avila Perspective, Chap. 322: Super Welterweight Week in SoCal
âKrusherâ Kovalev Exits on a Winning Note: TKOs Artur Mann in his âFarewell Fightâ
Gabriela Fundora KOs Marilyn Badillo and Perez Upsets Conwell in Oceanside
Floyd Mayweather has Another Phenom and his name is Curmel Moton
Avila Perspective, Chap. 323: Benn vs Eubank Family Feud and More
Floyd Mayweather has Another Phenom and his name is Curmel Moton
Arneâs Almanac: The First Boxing Writers Assoc. of America Dinner Was Quite the Shindig
Gabriela Fundora KOs Marilyn Badillo and Perez Upsets Conwell in Oceanside
âKrusherâ Kovalev Exits on a Winning Note: TKOs Artur Mann in his âFarewell Fightâ
Avila Perspective, Chap. 322: Super Welterweight Week in SoCal
TSS Salutes Thomas Hauser and his Bernie Award Cohorts
Mekhrubon Sanginov, whose Heroism Nearly Proved Fatal, Returns on Saturday
Jaron âBootsâ Ennis Wins Welterweight Showdown in Atlantic City
Boxing Notes and Nuggets from Thomas Hauser
Avila Perspective Chap 320: Boots Ennis and Stanionis
Dzmitry Asanau Flummoxes Francesco Patera on a Ho-Hum Card in Montreal
Remembering Hall of Fame Boxing Trainer Kenny Adams
Weekend Recap and More with the Accent of Heavyweights
Results and Recaps from Las Vegas where Richard Torrez Jr Mauled Guido Vianello
Filip Hrgovic Defeats Joe Joyce in Manchester
Avila Perspective, Chap. 320: Womenâs Boxing Hall of Fame, Heavyweights and More
History has Shortchanged Freddie Dawson, One of the Best Boxers of his Era
Ringside at the Fontainebleau where Mikaela Mayer Won her Rematch with Sandy Ryan
William Zepeda Edges Past Tevin Farmer in Cancun; Improves to 34-0
-
Featured Articles4 weeks agoBoxing Odds and Ends: The Wacky and Sad World of Livingstone Bramble and More
-
Featured Articles4 weeks agoAvila Perspective, Chap. 319: Rematches in Las Vegas, Cancun and More
-
Featured Articles4 weeks agoRingside at the Fontainebleau where Mikaela Mayer Won her Rematch with Sandy Ryan
-
Featured Articles4 weeks agoWilliam Zepeda Edges Past Tevin Farmer in Cancun; Improves to 34-0
-
Featured Articles3 weeks agoHistory has Shortchanged Freddie Dawson, One of the Best Boxers of his Era
-
Featured Articles3 weeks agoAvila Perspective, Chap. 320: Womenâs Boxing Hall of Fame, Heavyweights and More
-
Featured Articles3 weeks agoResults and Recaps from Las Vegas where Richard Torrez Jr Mauled Guido Vianello
-
Featured Articles3 weeks agoFilip Hrgovic Defeats Joe Joyce in Manchester