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Battle Hymn – Part 6: The Brink
Little Tiger Wade never fought in San Francisco again. He turned up in New York on August 11, 1945 at Madison Square Garden.
Fifteen thousand watched him fight Mario Raul Ochoa, a Cuban national champion in two divisions. Wade dropped him twice before the bout was stopped in the second round. In the main event, Jake LaMotta, then The Ring’s number-one middleweight contender, knocked out Jose Basora. The house receipts were twenty-times what Wade had ever seen in Illinois or California.
How did Wade land a much-coveted spot in a semi-final at the Garden? He had lost two of his last three fights (against the second, seventh, and fifth-rated middleweights, respectively), failed to crack the top-ten, fled San Francisco under a cloud of suspicion, and was inactive for months before the Ochoa fight. In addition, he had never even been to the East Coast, never mind New York City. There is only one explanation—he had somehow hooked up with a well-connected manager.
That manager was Carlos de Castanova, who was called “Charley Cook.”
In the shadows behind Cook’s stable was Eddie Coco. Ex-con, soldier in the Lucchese crime family, and friend of the notorious Frankie Carbo, Coco was a sure-thing gambler pulling strings behind front men and sometimes in plain sight. Everyone knew that a spot on the card at the Garden had a price and that “price” was usually a percentage. If the manager was not a friend already of the so-called “Combination” he had to grant a piece of his fighter to someone who was. Carbo and company had pieces of an untold number of fighters who fought at the Garden in the forties. Wade was probably no exception.
Ten days after Wade stopped Ochoa, he was in Pittsburgh facing Charley Burley. In October, he was in Baltimore facing a beast named Bert Lytell. Lytell was rated fourth in the ring ratings and Wade got serious. He left the pork alone, trained hard, and came into the ring at a chiseled 152 lbs—his lowest weight in over three years. By then, Murderers’ Row had learned to steer clear of Wade’s slinging shots or move in close to smother them and Lytell did just that. They fought on even terms until the last round when Wade besieged him and snatched the victory. All three judges scored the fight five rounds to four with one even.
The next morning, Wade would have collected his purse and perhaps grabbed the Baltimore Sun. In the sports section, two columns to the left of the headline “Wade defeats Bert Lytell,” was a column informing the boxing world that the titles were thawing out and the champions were being released from military duty. “Tony Zale, middleweight champ,” it read, “is among the fighters back in circulation.”
Wade was on the brink. He had just cracked the top ten in boxing’s deepest division and was promised a fight against Archie Moore, who was number-one at light heavyweight. If he could defeat Moore again, he would be within pouncing distance of Zale’s throne.
Wade-Moore II was scheduled for October 15 at St. Nicholas Arena. On October 10, Moore pulled out, claiming food poisoning. Wade faced Vincent “Hurricane” Jones who replaced Ossie Harris who had replaced Moore. Still, it was a main event promoted as “the first of a series of elimination matches” for a middleweight title shot. It was his second appearance in New York and proved no less ferocious than his first; he knocked Jones flat four times before the bout was stopped.
And then Wade, by then a full-blown alcoholic, went and chewed off his own tail.
It was like a mantra at Wade family get-togethers: “Aaron was just a hair’s breadth away from a title shot.” I heard it recently when Alan recalled his mother saying it. “Did you ever ask your father what happened, why he never got the shot?” I asked him. He had, and Wade’s answer is sobering. “I got drunk,” Wade told his son, “and cussed out the New York Commission.”
After stopping Jones at St. Nick’s, Wade was idle for four months. He dissipated. Any substance-abuse counselor will tell you that the bottle is upturned during downtimes and Wade took his to the Bowery, which was then New York City’s skid row. He would rent a room with no locks on the doors and binge-drink for days.
On February 4, 1946, he looked like a dumpling when he stepped into the ring at St. Nick’s to face Holman Williams. With a career-high 170 pounds packed onto his 5’5 frame, he was unprepared. He was dropped twice for nine counts in the second round before left hooks and a right cross concluded matters.
It was a spectacular knockout.
Or was it?
A closer look casts doubt. Williams was managed by another well-connected New York manager named “Broadway” Charley Rose. More suspicious than that are the hand injuries plaguing Williams, which had long-since required him to revert from boxer-puncher to defensive specialist. His overall knockout percentage was 18%. He had never before knocked out a ranked contender and after Wade, he never would again. In fact, he would lose over half his subsequent bouts before his career sputtered out in 1948. Wade, by contrast, was well-known as a sturdy fighter with no neck. He was not easily dented, particularly by an over-the-hill defensive specialist with brittle hands—unless he took a dive; or was drunk.
Wade retired in March. Why he retired offers another potential reason for his peculiar knockout. Wade underwent an operation on his eyes at a New York hospital. Charley Cook stepped up and paid the bills during the twenty-months he was out of action.
At the end of 1947, Cook took him to Holyoke, a Massachusetts mill town that Murderers’ Row used to regroup and derail up-and-comers. He concocted a narrative for the local press that said Wade had to leave San Francisco because “he ran out of opposition on the West Coast” and “is now picking on light heavyweights.” To account for the long-layoff, Cook said that Wade had suffered “eye cuts” in the Williams fight though neither the New York Times nor the Herald-Tribune mentioned that detail in their coverage. Cook was wisely covering up a far-more serious medical issue. The eye injury Wade had suffered at the hands of Jack Chase in 1944 had almost certainly caused traumatic cataracts which impeded his vision worse and worse over time. How successful the operation would prove was anyone’s guess.
Cook signed him to fight light-heavyweight Sam Baroudi on October 13, 1947 at the Valley Arena and hoped for the best. Cook may not have been completely confident; an article appeared in the Holyoke Transcript-Telegram before the fight that curiously refers to Wade as “Tiger Jack” Wade.
But Wade came through for himself and his manager. He jabbed to the body to set up overhands to take the first seven rounds and the decision. Baroudi was “peeved” until Wade offered a winner-take-all rematch; then he quieted down.
“Hurling challenges at any middleweight in the world,” reported the Transcript-Telegram, “including champion Rocky Graziano, ex-champion Tony Zale, and especially southpaw Bert Lytell, Aaron (Little Tiger) Wade, boxing’s modern Joe Walcott today shouted he will bar no one in the 160 pound ranks.”
He was ignored; so he told Cook that he’d fight anyone 177 lbs. or less.
After getting permission from the Massachusetts State Boxing Commission to stage a physical mismatch, Wade signed to face light heavyweight “Tiger” Ted Lowry on October 27. Lowry, a talented spoiler, would have a considerable height, weight, and reach advantage over Wade. He twice went the distance with Rocky Marciano and swore he did more than that: “I really beat him, you know,” he said in 2008. “He used to swing so wild. That’s like sending me a letter.”
Wade didn’t swing wild, but he swung hard. “It was a battle all the way,” said the Transcript-Telegram, “a slam-bang brawl.” Both Wade and Lowry “took turns jolting each other and Wade more than stood up under the heavy punishment the New Haven light heavy dealt.”
Outgunned though he was, Wade attacked Lowry as if nothing else mattered, as if Lowry was a shadow self that had to be defeated. Despite his existential effort and despite the fact that many fans “honestly believed he won the decision,” he lost. It was a fitting reflection of Wade’s battle with alcoholism and of his entire boxing career. He was at the brink, “within a hair’s breadth,” but what he sought he would not get. And as the decision was announced against him, whatever the 31-year-old ex-contender had left wafted off with the cigar smoke out of the Valley Arena and into the universe.
His manager saw it as a good loss. He immediately booked him to fight tenth-rated Anton Raadik and got him a stay-busy bout against young Wylie Burns. He didn’t know Wade’s spirit was broken.
Decades later, Wade would admit to his son that he had fought twice while drunk. Burns-Wade looks like one of them. Wade complained that he was “sick” in the middle of the fight. Over the last six rounds he “pawed around for Burns and did little or no punching” while he himself was “punched full of holes.” The body shots particularly did a number on him, as would be expected if he was drunk. When the referee came to his corner between rounds with a warning to put up an effort or get disqualified, Cook advised the referee to disqualify him and an argument broke out. Wade just hunched on his stool.
There was no come-from-behind surge, no heroic last stand. “Burns, An Unknown, Defeats Wade,” the paper announced the next morning. “The little giant of the middleweights and highly respected from coast to coast, was completely ignored” by a 4-1 underdog.
After the fight, Wade did what dying tigers do. He wandered off alone, away from the field of battle.
Wade-Ochoa in New York Times, 8/11/45; Details about Charley Cook, Eddie Coco, and the New York boxing scene found in “My Rugged Education in Boxing” by Robert K. Christenberry in LIFE 5/22/52; Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 8/29/36, Wade-Jones, New York Herald-Tribune 10/15, 16/45, New York Times, 10/16/45; Williams-Wade II in New York Herald-Tribune and New York Times 2/5/46; see also Pittsburgh Press, 10/10/45. Wade’s bouts in Holyoke in Holyoke Transcript & Telegram, 10/10, 11, 13, 14, 21, 24, 28/47 and 12/21, 23/47.
Springs Toledo can be contracted at scalinatella@hotmail.com.
Jaron “Boots Ennis and Eimantis Stanionus are in the wrong era.
If they had fought in the late 70s and early 80s the boxing world would have seen them regularly on televised fight cards.
Instead, with the world’s attention span diluted by thousands of available programming, this richly talented pair of undefeated welterweights Ennis (33-0, 29 Kos) and Stanionis (15-0, 9 Kos) will battle in the smaller confines of Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City on Saturday April 12.
Thankfully, DAZN will stream the WBA and IBF welterweight world title fight on the Matchroom Boxing card.
If not for DAZN these two elite fighters and the sport of pro boxing might be completely invisible to the sports entertainment world.
These welterweights are special.
Ennis, a lean whip-quick fighter out of Philadelphia, stylistically reminds me of a Tommy Hearns but not as tall or long-armed as the Detroit fighter of the past.
“Win on Saturday and I’m the WBA, IBF and Ring Magazine champion, and then we’ll see what’s next. But I am zoned in on Stanionis,” said Ennis the IBF titlist.
Lithuania’s Stanionis and his pressure style liken to a Marvelous Marvin Hagler who would walk through fire to reach striking distance of a foes chin or abdomen.
“Ennis is slick, explosive, and they say he’s the future of the division. That’s why I signed the contract. I don’t duck anyone—I run toward the fire,” Stanionis said.
When Hagler and Hearns met in Las Vegas on April 1985, their reputations had been built on television with millions watching against common foes like Roberto Duran and Juan Roldan. Both had different styles just like Stanionis and Ennis and both could punch.
One difference was their ability to take a punch.
Hagler had a chin of steel, Hearns did not.
When Ennis and Stanionis meet in the boxing ring this Saturday, each is facing the most dangerous fighter of his career. Whose chin will hold up is the true question?
“This isn’t gonna be a chess match. This is going to be a war,” said Stanionis who holds the WBA title. “I’m stepping into that ring to test him, break him, and beat him. Let’s see how he handles real pressure.”
Ennis just wants to win.
“I’m at the point right now where I don’t care what people say,” said Ennis. “I’m here to do one thing and that’s put hands on you, that’s it.”
Golden Boy in Oceanside, CA
Next week budding star Charles Conway (21-0, 16 Kos) meets Mexico’s Jorge Garcia Perez (32-4, 26 Kos) in the semi-main event at Frontwave Arena in Oceanside, California on Saturday April 19.
The two super welterweights are both ranked in the top 10 and the winner moves up to the elite level of the very stacked super welterweight division.
Conwell, who trains in Cleveland, Ohio, has been one of boxing’s best kept secrets and someone few champions and contenders want to face. Take my word for it, this kid can fight.
On the main event is undisputed female flyweight world champion Gabriela Fundora (15-0, 7 Kos) defending all her titles against Mexico’s Marilyn Badillo (19-0-1, 3 Kos).
Fundora is quickly becoming the most feared champion in boxing.
360 Promotions
Super welter prospect Sadridden Akhmedov (15-0, 13 Kos) meets Elias Espadas (23-6, 16 Kos) in the main event on Saturday April 19, at the Commerce Casino in Commerce, Calif. The 360 Promotions event will be streamed on UFC Fight Pass.
Also, Roxy Verduzco (3-0) meets Jessica Radtke (1-1-1) in a six rounds featherweight battle.
Fights to Watch
Sat. DAZN 5 p.m. Jarron Ennis (33-0) vs Eamantis Stanionis (15-0).
Photo credit: Mark Robinson
Dzmitry Asanau Flummoxes Francesco Patera on a Ho-Hum Card in Montreal
Camille Estephan’s Eye of the Tiger Promotions was at its regular pop stand at the Montreal Casino tonight. Upsets on Estephan’s cards are as rare as snow on the Sahara Desert and tonight was no exception.
The main event was a 10-round lightweight contest between Dzmitry “The Wasp” Asanau and Francesco Patera.
A second-generation prizefighter – his father was reportedly an amateur champion in Russia – Asanau, 28, had a wealth of international amateur experience and represented Belarus in the Tokyo Olympics. His punches didn’t sting like a wasp, but he had too much class for Belgium’s Patera whose claim to fame was that he went 10 rounds with current WBO lightweight champion Keyshawn Davis.
Two of the judges scored every round for the Wasp (10-0, 4 KOs) with the other seeing it 98-92. Patera falls to 30-6.
Co-Feature
Fast-rising Mexican-Canadian welterweight Christopher Guerrero was credited with three knockdowns en route to a one-sided 10-round decision over Oliver Quintana. A two-time Canadian amateur champion, Guererro improved to 14-0 (8).
The fight wasn’t quite as lopsided as what the scorecards read (99-88 and 98-89 twice). None of the knockdowns were particularly harsh and the middle one was a dubious call by the referee.
It was a quick turnaround for Guerrero who scored the best win of his career 8 weeks ago in this ring. The spunky but out-gunned Quintana, whose ledger declined to 22-4, was making his first start outside Mexico.
After his victory, Guerrero was congratulated by ringsider Terence “Bud” Crawford who has a date with Canelo Alvarez in September, purportedly in Las Vegas at the home of the NFL’s Raiders. Canelo has an intervening fight with William Scull on May 4 (May 3 in the U.S.) in Saudi Arabia.
Other Bouts of Note
In a fight without an indelible moment, Mary Spencer improved to 10-2 (6) with a lopsided decision over Ogleidis Suarez (31-6-1). The scores were 99-91 and 100-90 twice. Spencer was making the first defense of her WBA super welterweight title. (She was bumped up from an interim champion to a full champion when Terri Harper vacated the belt.)
A decorated amateur, the 40-year-old Spencer has likely reached her ceiling as a pro. A well-known sports personality in Venezuela, Suarez, 37, returned to the ring in January after a 26-month hiatus. An 18-year pro, she began her career as a junior featherweight.
In a monotonously one-sided fight, Jhon Orobio, a 21-year-old Montreal-based Colombian, advanced to 13-0 (11) with an 8-round shutout over Argentine campaigner Sebastian Aguirre (19-7). Orobio threw the kitchen sink at his rugged Argentine opponent who was never off his feet.
Wyatt Sanford
The pro debut of Nova Scotia’s Wyatt Sanford, a bronze medalist at the Paris Olympics, fell out when Sanford’s opponent was unable to make weight. The opponent, 37-year-old slug Shawn Archer, was reportedly so dehydrated that he had to be hospitalized.
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The flags at the International Boxing Hall of Fame in Canastota, New York, are flying at half-staff in honor of boxing trainer Kenny Adams who passed away Monday (April 7) at age 84 at a hospice in Las Vegas. Adams was formally inducted into the Hall in June of last year but was too ill to attend the ceremony.
A native of Cape Girardeau, Missouri, Adams was a retired Army master sergeant who was part of an elite squadron that conducted many harrowing missions behind enemy lines during the Vietnam War. A two-time All-Service boxing champion, his name became more generally known in 1984 when he served as the assistant coach of the U.S. Olympic boxing team that won 11 medals, eight gold, at the Los Angeles Summer Games. In 1988, he was the head coach of the squad that won eight medals, three gold, at the Olympiad in Seoul.
Adams’ work caught the eye of Top Rank honcho Bob Arum who induced Adams to move to Las Vegas and coach a team of fledgling pros that he had recently signed. Bantamweight Eddie Cook and junior featherweight Kennedy McKinney, Adams’ first two champions, bubbled out of that pod. Both represented the U.S. Army as amateurs. McKinney was an Olympic gold medalist. Adams would eventually play an instrumental role in the development of more than two dozen world title-holders including such notables as Diego Corrales, Edwin Valero, Freddie Norwood, and Terence Crawford.
When Eddie Cook won his title from Venezuela’s 36-1 Israel Contreras, it was a big upset. Adams, the subject of a 2023 profile in these pages, was subsequently on the winning side of two upsets of far greater magnitude. He prepared French journeyman Rene Jacquot for Jacquot’s date with Donald Curry on Feb. 11 1989 and prepared Vincent Phillips for his engagement with Kostya Tszyu on May 31, 1997.
Jacquot won a unanimous decision over Curry. Phillips stopped Tszyu in the 10th frame. Both fights were named Upset of the Year by The Ring magazine.
Adams’ home-away-from-home in his final years as a boxing coach was the DLX boxing gym which opened in the summer of 2020 in a former dry cleaning establishment on the west-central side of the city. It was fortuitous to the gym’s owner Trudy Nevins that Adams happened to live a few short blocks away.
“He helped me get the place up and running,” notes Nevins who endowed a chair, as it were, in honor of her esteemed helpmate.
No one in the Las Vegas boxing community was closer to Kenny Adams than Brandon Woods. “He was a mentor to me in boxing and in life in general, a father figure,” says Woods, who currently trains Trevor McCumby and Rocky Hernandez, among others.
Akin to Adams, Woods is a Missourian. His connection to Adams comes through his amateur coach Frank Flores, a former teammate of Adams on an all-Service boxing team and an assistant under Adams with the 1988 U.S. Olympic squad.
Woods was working with Nonito Donaire when he learned that he had cancer (now in remission). He cajoled Kenny Adams out of retirement to assist with the training of the Las Vegas-based Filipino and they were subsequently in the corner of Woods’ fighter DeeJay Kriel when the South African challenged IBF 105-pound title-holder Carlos Licona at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles on Feb. 16, 2019.
This would be the last time they worked together in the corner and it proved to be a joyous occasion.
After 11 rounds, the heavily favored Licona, a local fighter trained by Robert Garcia, had a seemingly insurmountable lead. He was ahead by seven points on two of the scorecards. In the final round, Kriel knocked him down three times and won by TKO.
“I will always remember the pep talk that Kenny gave DeeJay before that final round,” says Woods. “He said ‘You mean to tell me that you came all the way from across the pond to get to this point and not win a title?’ but in language more colorful than that; I’m paraphrasing.”
“After the fight, Kenny said to me, ‘In all my years of training guys, I never saw that.’”
The fight attracted little attention before or after (it wasn’t the main event), but it would enter the history books. Boxing writer Eric Raskin, citing research by Steve Farhood, notes that there have been only 16 instances of a boxer winning a world title fight by way of a last-round stoppage of a bout he was losing. The most famous example is the first fight between Julio Cesar Chavez and Meldrick Taylor. Kriel vs. Licona now appears on the same list.
Brandon Woods notes that the Veterans Administration moved Adams around quite a bit in his final months, shuffling him to hospitals in North Las Vegas, Kingman, Arizona, and then Boulder City (NV) before he was placed in a hospice.
When Woods visited Adams last week, Adams could not speak. “If you can hear me, I would say to him, please blink your eyes. He blinked.
“There are a couple of people in my life I thought would never leave us and Kenny is one,” said Woods with a lump in his throat.
Photo credit: Supreme Boxing
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A Fresh Face on the Boxing Scene, Bryce Mills Faces His Toughest Test on Friday
Bernard Fernandez Reflects on His Special Bond with George Foreman
A Paean to George Foreman (1949-2025), Architect of an Amazing Second Act
Notes and Nuggets from Thomas Hauser: Callum Walsh Returns to Madison Square Garden
Spared Prison by a Lenient Judge, Chordale Booker Pursues a World Boxing Title
Sebastian Fundora TKOs Chordale Booker in Las Vegas
Boxing Odds and Ends: The Wacky and Sad World of Livingstone Bramble and More
Ever-Improving Callum Walsh KOs Dean Sutherland at Madison Square Garden
Avila Perspective, Chap. 318: Aussie Action, Vegas 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
Results and Recaps from Sydney where George Kambosos Upended Late Sub Jake Wyllie
Nick Ball Wears Down and Stops TJ Doheny Before the Home Folks in Liverpool
Avila Perspective, Chap. 317: Callum Walsh, Dana White and More
High Drama in Japan as ‘Amazing Boy’ Kenshiro Teraji Overcomes Seigo Yuri Akui
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: Women’s 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
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: Women’s 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
Avila Perspective, Chap. 319: Rematches in Las Vegas, Cancun and More
Boxing Odds and Ends: The Wacky and Sad World of Livingstone Bramble and More
A Paean to George Foreman (1949-2025), Architect of an Amazing Second Act
Sebastian Fundora TKOs Chordale Booker in Las Vegas
Bernard Fernandez Reflects on His Special Bond with George Foreman
Results and Recaps from Sydney where George Kambosos Upended Late Sub Jake Wyllie
Avila Perspective, Chap. 318: Aussie Action, Vegas and More
Spared Prison by a Lenient Judge, Chordale Booker Pursues a World Boxing Title
Notes and Nuggets from Thomas Hauser: Callum Walsh Returns to Madison Square Garden
Ever-Improving Callum Walsh KOs Dean Sutherland at Madison Square Garden
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