Howard Cosell
WHEN MANY YEARS BECOME MANY DECADES
San Francisco, CA– Like the late Howard Cosell, I feel like giving up on boxing. After all, it was Howard who said, “You can’t clean dirt,” and yet here I am 20+ years after Cosell took his last breathe getting out of bed each morning thinking that my honesty, be it brutal at times, is worthwhile. In the early days, almost 30 years ago, I used to be a like a kid at Christmas, reading wire service stories, the boxing rags (magazines) and reading newspaper columnists, most notably Jack Fiske, Eddie Muller, and Al Corona. Now there are so many so-called boxing experts out there the so-called boxing press has been watered down to the point you don’t who to believe, or who is bought and paid for.
THE MONEY IS GONE!
While I find some solitude seeing guys are getting their kicks writing boxing, the money is no longer there, and there are so many whores in the boxing blogosphere, that when you combine that with the people that wouldn’t know a left hook from a fish hook, the overall coverage of the business side of the sport, which is more important than what actually ends up in the ring, has been lost. Mike Marley, once the NY Post columnist, and in my my mind the best in the late 80′s outside of Hall of Famer Jack Fiske, now seems to have gotten lost in being Bob Arum’s P.R. spokesperson. In his prime, when MM went after a story, he left no rock unturned, now he appears to be on occasion turning out Top Rank press releases. Once an attorney, MM’s work for me got me in nothing but trouble. That being said, maybe age has taken the edge of the machete that used to Mike “The Menace” Marley.
THERE IS NOBODY LEFT BUT MARLEY & MYSELF
Yeah, the great Graham Houston is still writing, but he has avoided controversy in the three decades I’ve known him as if it were the plague. Fight News, while I admire their “grunts,” the guys running the site, Karl Freitag and “Flathead,” they are so far up Bob Arum’s ass that the Top Rank skipper need not undergo a Colonoscopy, all Arum’s Dr.’s have to do is call Karl to see whether Arum has any polyps. The other boxing websites, including Maxboxing.com, they will on occasion run with something risque, but considering their reach, it’s far too infrequent.
“GRIZZLY ADAMS” LIKE GEORGE KIMBALL WASN’T AFRAID
Unlike the media prostitute Norm Frauenheim, formerly of the Arizona Republic, a man allegedly accused by some to take drugs, broads, hotel rooms and money from promoters like Top Rank, Boston’s George Kimball, who died earlier this year, was the best Boston had. His rival at the other Beantown paper was Ron Borgess, who, if my memory isn’t failing me, was accused of plagiarism, at least he stole items from me, all the while using a disclaimer something like. “Some of the information here was taken from online Internet sites.” Kimball, a heavy drinker and smoker who succumbed from his chain smoking threw straight punches.
NO MORE HEROIC WRITERS TO LOOK TO
Michael Katz, then of the NY Daily News and Wallace “Wally” Matthews, then of NY Newsday, these were another pair of writers with integrity, backbone that bathed in straight honest journalism. Wally’s working ESPN radio, Katz I’ve been told is retired in Nevada. Truth be told, if I were an aspiring boxing writer as I was in the 80′s, today, present company excluded, there would be nobody to hitch my wagon to. Sad but true. Like the lobbyists control Washington DC, a few self serving folks control the sport of boxing. In closing, some unknowingly might think that boxing is in a good state, when it isn’t. When promoters can steal from fighters and nobody has the balls to write about, well, they (the writers) have become part of the problem and not the solution.
ARUM, KING, “MOST” (NOT ALL) OF THE PROMOTERS ARE SCUM!
Which brings me back to the famous Howard Cosell quote, “You can’t clean dirt.”
Pedro Fernandez