Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, April 18, 1991 TAG: 9104180503
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C-6 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: By GEORGE VECSEY/ THE NEW YORK TIMES
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
These things tend to go in flurries, and boxing has another potential disgrace coming up this Friday, the championship match between the fit and the fat.
The only question is: What will be more disgraceful, if 28-year-old Evander Holyfield smacks 42-year-old George Foreman all over Atlantic City, or if Foreman pounds Holyfield into the ocean?
For better or worse, the spectacle of an athletically old man lumbering back into action has galvanized a lot of people who normally avoid boxing like the plague.
Unfortunately, any time your grumpy neighborhood abolitionist finds himself at all interested in an upcoming fight, he recognizes that hype sells tickets. This, emphatically, is not a call to go out and patronize the pay-per-view weasels who are separating the affluent from the poor.
The old days when a poor family could huddle around a television and watch the home team are long gone. Cable has divided entire cities, usually by income and race. Pro football is oozing its way toward pay-per-view Super Bowls by insisting it just wants this tiny piece of the action. Oh, yes.
Foreman vs. Holyfield belongs to people with money to spend. Still, they are going to fight, a 28-year-old champion at the peak of his career, and a 42-year-old with jelly doughnuts in his midsection but sledgehammers in his gloves.
This is not a case of Nolan Ryan throwing fastballs at 44, or Martina Navratilova going for her 10th Wimbledon plate at 34 or Robert Parish still running the court at 37, or Joe Montana scampering around at 35 next season, relative old age for athletes. Those people never went away.
Foreman is a man who spent nearly a decade feeding his face and preaching the word to a tiny congregation in the scrub-pine flatlands outside Houston.
In his decade away, George Foreman seemed to have two personalities: a vicious youth who had gone into boxing as a natural progression of his street activities, and a true believer who had found peace in the Gospel. The two identities clashed, like a sedate business suit on Pete Rose.
Now George Foreman is back hitting people again. Whether civilization, if we can call it that, should license such activities is not the issue today. What does it say about the so-called sweet science that he can wallow back into the ring?
This is either a fraud or a reality. But which? What do you do when you want an expert diagnosis? You go to a doctor. In this case, the doctor is 41-year-old Harold "Hackie" Reitman, who is both a heavyweight and an orthopedic surgeon, two callings as diverse as heavyweight and preacher.
The story of how Reitman returned to his old love, boxing, after his daughter was spared following delicate brain surgery was told in this space more than a year ago. Suffice it to say that Reitman has now won eight, lost one and drawn two as a professional.
While his colleagues are out hitting a little white ball, Reitman spends his hours in the Fifth Street Gym in Miami Beach, hitting punching bags and human beings.
"The guys I spar with," Reitman said, "they all get this goofy smile on their face when they talk about Foreman. Anybody who's ever been in the ring with him will tell you, `This blankety-blank can hit.' Trevor Berbick told me, `Foreman hit me so hard in the hip, I limped for a week.' Mark Young told me, `You want to die."'
Reitman sparred with Adilson Rodrigues, the only common opponent, who was knocked out in two rounds by each of them. Rodrigues made Holyfield sound like a walk on the beach and Foreman like getting hit by a taxi.
"People don't know this," Reitman said, "but a hitter is a hitter until he is 90. That's why there are two different boxings. Heavyweight boxing is street fighting. It's why people pay big money to see it. The element of danger."
Reitman, who has encountered resistance to his own late-blooming career, recognizes that some people are appalled or suspicious.
"I would rather this be somebody else than Foreman," Reitman said. "This is the epitome of the boxer, in great shape, vs. a fat slob.
"But you know what else this is? This is ageism. People hate older people," added Reitman. "In one way, it would be terrific for boxing and society if Foreman could beat Holyfield."
The doctor's prediction? "Foreman will destroy him." The abolitionist's prediction? Foreman in a knockout, setting training back 50 years. Therefore, boxing loses. But we're all talking about it. Therefore, boxing wins. And that's the point.
by CNB