Saddiq Surprises

I attended the 2006 Tony Zale Chicago Park District Citywide Boxing Tournament (that's a mouthful) llast night. I had never been to that tournament before. It was held at Curie High School on the southwest side, a school that boasts about having the biggest gym in the city. I'll give them that. My high school's gym was huge, but Curie's looked like they had more room. Recognizing that the school sits in an area that has had its share of racial problems, like a lot of neighborhoods in Chicago, I got off the train prepared for smart remarks from passersby.

Two rings were set up. There were too many boxers to have one match going on at a time. A little confusing to hear two sets of bells going off, however. Hard to tell sometimes when the round had ended for which fight, and the boxers were thrown off a little bit, too. Things went along at a fast clip. There was no time to linger. Barry gave me his video camera and asked me to tape the matches.

A few of Barry's boxers--Joe, Freddie, Alex, Kevin and Montrell--were on hand. Only Joe, Freddie and Kevin had matches, and of those boys, only Freddie came out a victor. The towel was thrown in on Joe. Montrell was expected to get a match, but I'm not sure what happened with that. Some of us from Steve's stable were there--Mike, Junior and Saddiq. Saddiq's fight was at the end of the evening. I think his bout was number thirty-nine.

Saddiq was quiet and appeared to be a bit nervous before his bout. Once he stepped into the ring, the pops he gave his opponent echoed off the walls of the gym. The crowd had thinned out a little by that time, but those who were left were fascinated by what they saw. So was I. A man with an island accent stood next to me and asked, "Where dat boy from?" "Nigeria, I believe," I answered. "Dat boy fights like a muthafucka!" the man exclaimed. Just then, Saddiq cracked a fist into the face of the other boy. "If I got hit like dat, I'd have to go for my guns!" the man continued. I laughed at his remark. Saddiq then knocked the other boxer to the ground. About three times, the other boxer had to take an eight count. "They might as well stop da fight!" the man said. "No sense in dat boy gettin' hurt!" The referree agreed with him and did so. "He's young," the man told another bystander, referring to the losing boxer, "he can fight at another time."

The usual cast of characters were at the tournament--Shifty, Kitchen (who I found out last week was a former Golden Gloves champion), Allan, Gary, Yale, Chupi (a coach at Windy City Gym), and the coach everyone loves to hate, George. Tina, a major player in Chicago's amateur boxing scene, was also there, as was Samantha, a teenaged boxer who had come down to Loyola once.