A Boxer Fighting the Odds, and One Who KOd Himself

Fighters learn lessons in the gym. Under a skillful trainer’s direction, they can learn how to double up on the jab, slip a punch, tie up an opponent inside, fight off the ropes. Some guys never get it. But find someone with natural ability and instincts and parlay that combo with desire and discipline, and you’ve got yourself a prizefighter with a future.

A light rain is falling outside the Westminster Boxing Club as half a dozen young fighters go through their paces. Feinting, jabbing, hitting the heavy bag, trying to master the footwork--that’s the tedium of learning their craft. The gym walls are plastered with yellowing programs of fight cards from both famous and long-forgotten arenas. Paste-ups of magazine covers featuring some of the sport’s big names--Leonard, Holyfield, Benitez, Tyson--remind the young fighters where they want to go. Another sign, however--”No Pay; No Train”--reminds them of where they are now.

It’s the day after Mike Tyson, the once-indestructible heavyweight champ of the world, discovered that not all lessons are learned in the gym. After pulverizing most of the men he’d ever faced, Tyson was brought to his knees by a 108-pound woman and an Indianapolis jury that believed he raped her. In a month, a judge will decide what price Tyson will pay.

Montel Griffin is wrapping up a midafternoon workout at the Westminster club. A light-heavyweight, he’s a couple weeks away from competing in the national amateur championships in Colorado, a possible steppingstone to the Olympic Trials and a berth on the U.S. team.

A soft-spoken 20-year-old Chicagoan now living in Westminster and training under Jesse Reid, Griffin has been around boxing much of his life. His father was once part of Muhammad Ali’s traveling show. “He’s an exceptional athlete,” Reid says of Griffin, “because of his speed and intelligence. He’s a good kid too.”

On this afternoon, Reid is working on a problem: Griffin’s power is such that when he punches, it affects his balance. “Let it drag, let it drag,” Reid says, referring to Griffin’s right foot. “Point your knee.”

After the workout, Griffin talks about Mike Tyson and his guilty verdict. “As a boxer, it hurts,” he says. “But as a person, it hurts even more. I don’t like to see him go down like this, especially if he’s innocent.”

If Tyson committed the crime, Griffin says, he should do the time. But Griffin is wary of the details of the incident and says the woman should have been aware of Tyson’s reputation and penchant for possible violence. Going up to his hotel in the wee hours was dumb, he says, and he doesn’t think the woman is dumb. “She was in a pageant, she has to be smart to appeal to the judges; she has to have intelligence. She had to have known what kind of person Tyson was.”

Griffin says he understands the “aura” that develops around celebrities like Tyson, where “everybody wants to be around him, wants to touch him.” But while he admires Tyson’s boxing skill and generally liked what he saw of him, Griffin says he was never star-struck. Rather, he always saw Tyson both as a vulnerable fighter and also as a tragic figure whose out-of-the-ring violence is not typical of most boxers.

“Most fighters are gentle people outside the ring,” Griffin says. “They take out their frustrations inside the ring, but aren’t violent outside. I think Mike Tyson had a bad upbringing--he never had the love of a mother and father. And even with what (trainer) Cus D’Amato did with him (in helping him turn from youth crime to boxing), without good parents you don’t learn the finer points of life.”

Reid comes over to talk and says of Griffin: “A kid like that, you want to see do well, because he’s good for the sport. Tyson had talent that was God-given, but he blew it.”

Griffin understands he’s choosing a profession where he’s marked going in.

“Before Mike Tyson, boxing was on the upswing,” he says. “I don’t know what’s going to happen now, but I think I can make a good name for myself. Boxing can do good things for me, and I can do some good for boxing.”

Reid, who says he’s been in the corner of some outstanding fighters, thinks Griffin has star potential. “Remember his name,” he says.

Mike Tyson had the talent, the instincts, the desire, the discipline. He learned most things the gym could teach him. But he’s no longer a prizefighter with a future.

He’s just a troubled guy with a past, a fighter who thought the only lessons he needed to learn came in the gym.