Mr. Hopkins Is On Point

Claressa Shields is FINALLY on the front cover of The Ring magazine.  She should have been featured there four years ago when she received her first Olympic gold medal.

Before the article about Ms. Shields, there is an excellent opinion piece by Bernard Hopkins entitled "Boxing Is Losing Black Kids".  He hit on most of the things that frustrate me as an amateur boxing coach -- unmotivated, soft, and undisciplined youths; lack of support for amateur boxing programs, especially from parents and guardians; the closing of amateur boxing programs; youths being lured away by football, basketball, and dreams of being rappers.  He could have also added the problem of youths confusing professional wrestling and MMA with boxing.  They know more about what's going on in the WWE and the UFC than they do about professional boxing.

Mr. Hopkins stated that he did not believe that boxing would ever go back to the time of having "multiple African-American superstar fighters after this current generation".  Unfortunately, the man is probably right.  Boxing has fallen out of favor not only with Black youths but with all American youths in general.  The field house I work in sits in an area populated by both Black and Latino youths.  Gentrification is slowly creeping in, and I've seen some white people occupying some properties nearby.  But getting any of those youths, regardless of their ethnicity, to sign up for the boxing program and stick with it is a hard task.

The situation is enough for any amateur boxing coach to want to throw the towel in.  It is only the love of the sport and the fact that sometimes we get one or two kids who are really interested that keeps most of us around.

Trash Talking and Registration

There are plenty of professional female boxers that The Ring could have put on its front cover, not just this year, but in years prior.  Laila Ali, Ann Wolfe, Ana Julaton. . . .the list goes on and on.  Instead, Ronda Rousey, a MMA star, gets the cover because she's popular at the moment, and she's interested in boxing.

But then she faced Holly Holm, a former professional boxer who switched over to MMA, most likely because of more pay, and hopefully, more recognition.  Rousey lost in a stunning upset in the second round.  Rousey's usual trash-talking apparently did nothing to intimidate Holm.  I'm not here to bash Rousey.  She is good in her sport of choice.  But most MMA fighters don't have a good hand game or good ring generalship, both of which Holm has.  I'm hoping The Ring magazine -- which has hinted that they may "open the door" to more MMA coverage -- thinks long and hard about giving press to a sport that has nothing to do with boxing.

Now that I have the correct dates for the winter boxing classes, I will put in a request for a flyer to be made.  I'm going to include a line that states I will not take any new students once the winter session passes the halfway mark.  This current fall session is the last time I'm dealing with those who wait several weeks before deciding to sign up.  The less disruptions I have to deal with in the gym, the better.  I'm not a Chicago Public Schools teacher; I don't have to alter my lesson plans to allow students who are behind in their grades to play catch up.

In the case of the adults, it even makes less sense to allow someone to pay their money for a class that is halfway over.  The cost of the class will not be prorated, and the adults will have to turn around in a short time to pay the fee again for the next session.  I'd rather not have to deal with grumbling adults about that.

Coaching This Week

There are posters in the gym that were up on the walls long before I was hired as a coach.  However, I needed to add some more pictures to the available bulletin boards.  I used to keep my old copies of The Ring magazine, but one of the last times I did a cleaning purge, I threw most of them out.  A few of the ones I kept as collectors' items I did not cut up.  But I did cut up the most recent copies I had for the gym's bulletin boards.  The Ring does feature stories about female fighters these days, but I was a bit miffed that I didn't have enough photos of female fighters to post.  One of my goals is to attract a number of girls to take up boxing.  It would be nice if they could see plenty of pictures of other women in the sport.  I still have to look among my stuff to see if I have any more boxing pictures.

I found out that I have to turn in a lesson plan.  I've been working on that for the last month.  The goal is to get across that conditioning is just as important as knowing how to throw punches.  I want to cut down on the "all I have to do is spar" thinking that I've witnessed out of people in other gyms.  In fact, I'm only allowing sparring to happen once a week, and that aspect of the training will not begin until next month.

I have a handout for parents which is on the staff computer at the field house.  It explains what amateur boxing is and what it isn't.  Most of the parents who have expressed a desire for their kids to be in the class are okay with their kids being in the sport.  The handout is more for parents who may uneasy with their kids wanting to box.

There's still not much equipment on hand for the kids who will start in the gym this week; more will come in eventually.  Luckily, boxing is not one of those sports that require a lot of equipment to get started.  There will be a big emphasis on shadow boxing and floor exercises for awhile.

I keep thinking about how I want the kids to address me.  "Coach" or my first name (or a combination) will be fine.  But I rather not be known as "Miss Hillari".  Makes me sound like some old schoolmarm in the Old West. I didn't mind when kids at the church where I used to attend called me that, but it doesn't sound right for the gym.

Speaking of church, I did try out a new one today.  If you've been following this blog for awhile, you know some of the difficulties I had at the church where I used to be a member (and from what I keep hearing, not much has changed).  It's been a little over a year since I attended regular services.  Afterwards, I had coffee with other newcomers to the church, a church member, and the pastor and his wife.  People were asked what they did for a living.  Everyone went wide-eyed when I told them I coach boxing.  "We would have never guessed that!" people said.

Using Boxing In A Crowd

I forgot to take my camera to the gym again.  The photo above is of the place where I usually buy copies of The Ring magazine.

I was a little tired.  Spent most of the weekend partying -- well, partying as much as a middle-aged person can do.  I went to three festivals over the past weekend: the Ginza Festival, Retro on Roscoe, and North Halsted Market Days.  Just as I was leaving the North Halsted Market Days festival, I got caught up in a massive, thick crowd. Being as short as I am, it would have very easy for me to be trampled and stomped on.  It was that serious.  Normally, I get panicky around crowds.  Here's where some boxing experience kicked in.  I couldn't push my way through the crowd.  Others around me were pushing, shoving. . . I thought a fight or a full-scale riot would break out.   I just remained calm, followed lines that were moving, and remained observant.  Eventually, I made it out.

This photo is of one of Superdawg, a famous hot dog place where Alan is always going to eat.  One location is in Wheeling; the closest one to me is on the far northwest side.  I don't get up there that often, not since I lost Dad's car in an accident several years ago.  Neither Alan or I need to going there, truth be told, but the place has very good food.

In the gym, I was the only woman again.  Gabriel, Tyson, Professor, Khan, John, and a new face named Danny, were in attendance.  There was round robin sparring between the guys.  John and Tyson had the toughest sparring session.  Alan tried to slow them down, but the action remained a bit intense.  There were many good exchanges between them.

Khan got in with Gabriel, but they only had one round together.  Khan hung in there as best he could.  But before he stepped into the ring, he told Alan that it had been a long time since he sparred last.  Khan reached up to get shots in when he had Gabriel backed in a corner.

I had two rounds with Gabriel, and that was enough.  Gabriel's very tall, so like Khan, I had to reach up -- way up -- to get some shots in.  Alan commented that I often don't get the overhand right in easy on others, but I got one in on Gabriel.  Gabriel ducked down to my height several times to get punches in.  I got some hooks and straight rights to his body, because I really couldn't reach his head often.  During the second round, Gabriel did a very smart move by keeping me jammed up in corners and against the ropes.  "Get out of the corner," I heard Alan say.  He also told me to tie Gabriel up when I was blocked in, but I wanted to practice turning out of the corner instead.  Afterwards, Gabriel was slumped against a corner.  "Are you okay?" I asked.  "Hell, no," Gabriel smiled.  He had done a lot of rounds with everybody, except for Professor, who mostly observed the action.

My bag gloves have just about had it.  The thumb on the right glove is going to tear open completely one of these days.  But I'm going to have to wait awhile to replace it.  Just got notice a couple of days ago that another coach's clinic is coming up, which means, I'll have to shell out money for that.   I just paid for a coach's license a few months ago, before the Golden Gloves took place.  USA Boxing changed some of the amateur boxing rules, so all coaches have to be up on the new changes before a certain date or else we can't work the corners.  Hopefully this certification will cover me through the 2014 Golden Gloves.

Boxing's Problems In My Opinion

I was reading an article in The Ring about a bit of feuding between Top Rank Promotions and Golden Boy Promotions involving the possibility of a fight between J.C. Chavez Jr. and Miguel Cotto.  The writer of the article, Ivan Goldman, stated, ". . .feuds are dumb.  And they hurt business."  He's right.  More dissension is not needed in boxing.  Instead, many improvements are needed:

1.  A national boxing commission, the idea of which has been brought up by ESPN boxing analyst Teddy Atlas and Sen. John McCain many times.  It would cut down on professional boxers who shouldn't be fighting for various reasons including major health issues and loaded hand wraps, for example, attempting to get their licenses reinstated by commissions in different states whom they think will help their cause.  If everyone is on the same page concerning the rules, then the sport is safer and fair for everyone.

2.  One definite champ for each category.  There was a time in boxing history when this was the case.  Somewhere down the line, all the alphabet sanctioning bodies (as The Ring magazine refers to them) got involved.  So we have several heavyweight champions, several middleweight champions, and so on.  A few years ago, I had a guy tell me that was why he didn't the follow the sport any more; it was too confusing to keep up with which boxer was at the top.

3.  Follow the lead of Cuba and other countries where boxing is regarded as a top-tier sport.  Cuba has long been known as having an excellent boxing program that trains up world class fighters.  I hear people complain that there are no major American heavyweight boxers, and most of the ones now are from the Ukraine and Russia.  Obviously those countries still have a major respect for pugilism.  Boxing used to have that kind of respect in the good ol' USA, but when was the last time you heard a major boxing match be the lead story on the sports segment of local or national newscasts?  Every once in awhile, I hear of some college that has a boxing program as part of their overall sports program, but that's rare.  I have yet to see the sport included in the physical fitness programs in grade and high schools (while the football, basketball, and soccer teams get top billing). Private gyms and city-run recreation centers offer boxing, but often times, the young people who really want and need to get to them can't afford to pay the gym fees. 

4.  Stop ignoring and dismissing the presence of women fighters, managers, promoters and trainers.  I've mentioned on this blog before that the road to being a professional female boxer is not smooth.  Males often start training younger and have more avenues to get experience.  Before the boxing analysts start complaining about the quality of some the female boxers they see, they need to think about that.  The boxing magazines rarely mention anything about female boxers, managers, promoters and trainers, and they certainly aren't doing full-blown articles about them.  Despite the fact that there are plenty of female boxers -- both amateurs and professionals -- some still treat the women as jokes, or worst yet, insinuate that they should stay in their place, wherever the hell that is.  A key to seeing that boxing survives is to acknowledge and celebrate everybody in it.  The "old boys club" mentality is so 20th century.

5.  Put boxing back on the TV networks.  Hey, if I'm not able to pay my cable bill for any reason, then I don't get to see any boxing matches on TV.  Don't get me started on those high pay-per-view fees for some of the bigger matches.  I listen to those older than me talk about boxing matches regularly aired on the major television networks (ABC, NBC, CBS) back in the day, and I envy them.    There has been efforts to have the major matches shown in movie theaters (Mayweather v. Mosley, for example), but not every movie house is -- or will -- show the fights.  That could be a reason why the audience for boxing has shrunk over the decades because the fights are not accessible to everyone who want to see them. Personally, I can do without the constant football/baseball/basketball go-round on the TV networks.

Poor Man's Sport

Jay, a friend of Alan's, stopped by the gym Monday night.  Ed B. and Hatk were walking around the ring during the rest period in-between rounds of sparring.  "Boxing is a poor man's sport," Jay commented, and Ed B. and I agreed.

I remember Steve saying something similar back in the day.  Certain sports, like tennis, horse racing, and professional ice skating, with a few exceptions, tend to be populated by the upper middle class and rich.  Some sports require a big layout of money in order to participate.  Not so boxing.  Show up with wearing a T-shirt and sweatpants or shorts, a decent pair of gym shoes and a pair of hand wraps, and you're good to go. 

Jay also said that Chicago is a "cemetary" for those who wish to turn professional.  There seems to be a long-standing agreement that there's not much boxing talent nor opportunities in the Midwest, period.  "Guys may get 10, 15 fights maybe," Jay said, "but then they run into a boxer from elsewhere and get stopped."  I read the boxers' standings in The Ring magazine, and there are very few pro boxers out of this area.  I don't know what that's about, but there are good fighters around.  Breaks may be hard to come by, but all hope is not out of the window. 

Alan asked Kevin if he wanted to fight at Seward next week, but Kevin grinned sheepishly and said "no".  "You want a fight at Brooks?  With the same girl you fought at our show?" Alan asked me.  "Yeah, I'd like to get another trophy on my birthday," I grinned. 

The Floater's Already There

The rain and the damp, cool weather must have put most people off last night.  Only Jamil, Donald, and myself were in the gym, outside of Alan. Alan and I sparred.  Once again, my left eye took a shot.

A look in the mirror confirmed that my eye was red, but no other damage was visible.  I worry about that eye because it has a floater in it.  I don't know exactly how long it's been there, but I do know it started sometime after I was laid off from the agency two years ago.  I just woke up one morning and noticed a little dark wisp traveling across my pupil.  It's probably a little blood that seeped out from the vessels in my eye.  Who knows how it got there?  I don't remember taking extremely bad hits to my eye or head (other than what normally happens when I spar).  It's been time to see an eye doctor, but I need to find an inexpensive one that is knowledgeable about diabetes.  My father had cataracts, and at the time of his death, there was a tumor behind one of his eyes.  He refused to let doctors do anything about it.  I'd rather be more proactive about my sight.

A letter that I had forgotten I'd written to The Ring magazine was printed in their latest issue.  The issue has Manny Pacquiao on the cover (who by the way, won a political election in the Philippines recently).  A columinist wrote an article not long ago complaining about ring card girls, and I agreed with him.  Now if only "The Bible of Boxing" would cover more of the female boxing scene, I'd be very happy.