WeinLanguage: Personality Packs A Punch

Most boxing people are not politically correct. Then again, it’s often not politically correct to have any personality at all.

If there’s one thing that boxing people do have in abundance, it’s personality. I had the pleasure of attending a panel on boxing at Harvard Law School over the weekend. The panel had three speakers: Wilber “Skeeter” McClure, 1960 Olympic gold medalist and former chair of the Mass. State boxing commission; Lou DiBella, a 1985 Harvard Law graduate who served as an executive for HBO sports before launching his own DiBella Entertainment; and finally Bert Randolph Sugar, former editor of Ring magazine and boxing writer extraordinaire.

During one exchange, DiBella provided an astonishing and counter-intuitive statistic. Though big boxing events are only available to the masses on expensive pay-per-view, the ethnic group that (in terms of percentage) watches the most pay per view events is Latinos.

“Yeah,” responds Sugar, “But they’re all crammed in to the same house.” The audience at the law school was divided in laughter and gasps. Bert Sugar is definitely not a racist, but the comment was politically incorrect. But it was also once politically incorrect for Cassius Clay to change his name to Muhammad Ali and embrace the Nation of Islam. Boxing people aren’t always out to please you, but more often than not, they’ll entertain.

Indeed, all three speakers were characters, interrupting one another repeatedly. DiBella provided authoritative information on the miserable state of boxing, presenting himself as a no-nonsense class act in a world of scoundrels. Skeeter came off as a tough guy who knows his business. Sugar, nonetheless, stood out. With his classic fedora and cigar, he contributed the insightful information of an experienced journalist and the humor of an old vaudeville performer.

“I graduated from law school and then I passed the bar,” announced Sugar. “And that was the last bar I ever passed.” Badum ching. “I had to choose between two law schools, Harvard and Michigan. Harvard told me to choose Michigan. I’m probably still on the waiting list here.”

Sugar was not the only panelist with good lines. After DiBella stated that no boxer had ever bled to death in the ring, yet observed that many fights were being stopped because of cuts, Skeeter cut in with: “Sissies.”

These characters are not alone in the sport. George Foreman advertised his grill in the post-fight interview of his controversial loss to Shannon Briggs. He’s gone from the silent and scary monster we saw in When We Were Kings to the cuddly teddy bear on infomercials. The Shakespeare-spewing Don King may be evil, but I bet he’s always the life of the party. Mike Tyson may have odd eating habits, but he is not boring.

“I don’t know anything about being the heavyweight champion or being a good, respectable person,” Tyson once said. “I don’t want to strip [champions] of their titles, I want to strip them of their health.”

It was not politically correct for former heavyweight champ Hasim Rahman to question reigning champion Lennox Lewis’ sexual orientation, and perhaps less correct for Lewis to ask for Rahman’s sister to set the record straight. Nonetheless, when the two wrestled in a pre-fight meeting on ESPN, Rahman succeeded in doing something that no previous Lewis opponent had done: allowed the champ to show that he at least some of the personality required to be a fighter.

A couple of weeks after Sept. 11, middleweight Bernard Hopkins provided a New York crowd with a stunning 12th round knockout of highly regarded Felix Trinidad to become undisputed champion. After the victory, Hopkins, who had grown up poor and spent time in prison, played on American emotions but still sounded sincere: “I am the American Dream!” he proclaimed. He was being humorous, ever the showman, but there was an element of truth to his words. He had struggled through a great deal, waited a long time for his second chance and finally made good.

When New Mexico Governer Gary Johnson—who also spoke at Harvard over the weekend—proclaimed himself “The American Dream” for starting his own handyman company out of college, somehow it sounded more pompous than inspirational.

Boxing has always been an inspirational sport: look at the role Muhammad Ali and Joe Louis played as heroes to the black community.

“Rich guys don’t become fighters” proclaimed Lou DiBella, and it’s true. In the early 20th century, Irish, Italian and Jewish immigrants ruled the sport—now Blacks and Hispanics reign supreme.

“Boxers aren’t choir boys,” commented Sugar, but they are often personalities who make the path from poverty to prizefighting a terrific story.

Indeed, boxing has been inspirational to some of the best writers on earth. George Plimpton ’48, Norman Mailer ’43, Ernest Hemingway, Joyce Carol Oates and others have all dabbled in writing about the sport.

Despite its past glory, boxing today is filled with corruption and in a miserable state—Sugar mockingly promoted the upcoming fight between old man Larry Holmes and obese blob Butterbean.

It is a niche sport, with a small but loyal fan base, but it is also a billion-dollar industry. The guys who make the money are the Tysons and De La Hoyas, but they are not the best the sport has to offer. The boxers who never quit, who get up off the canvas and keep on battling—these are the warriors who inspire us.

On May 18, Arturo Gatti is squaring off against Mickey Ward in a junior welterweight fight in Uncasville, Conn., to be aired live on HBO. Since most Harvard students don’t watch enough TV to recognize Nick from “Survivor,” it’s unlikely that many have heard of these two fighters, which is a shame.

Gatti is Italian, Ward is Irish. Neither fighter is exceptional, but both are brawlers who know no defense. Both are bleeders—Gatti cuts so easily that he wakes up in the morning with his eyes swelling and starts bleeding “somewhere between O Canada and the Star Spangled Banner,” according to Sugar.

You think Michael Jordan has heart? These guys have so much they make the Care Bears jealous.

This bout has “Fight of the Year” written all over it. I recommend it to anyone with any interest in sports, in never-say-die attitudes and inspirational events, even if you all have to cram into the same house to see it.