This Woman’s Place Is in Ring--on TV

Five years ago, Christy Salters walked into Jim Martin’s gym in Bristol, Tenn., and said she wanted to be a boxer.

She hardly looked the part. An attractive, 22-year-old substitute teacher from West Virginia, Salters had a soft voice and smooth, unmarked hands and face.

Yeah, Martin thought, and I want to be Miss America.

“I was going to tell one of my fighters to get in the ring with her and break her ribs to get rid of her,” he said. “I didn’t have time for that.”

Instead, it was Salters who broke down Martin.

Christy Salters is now Christy Martin. She wound up marrying her hostile trainer, 25 years her senior.

And she is indeed a boxer, a 135-pounder considered among the best in the world in the still small community of female boxers. Martin is 32-2-2 with 23 knockouts and is billed as a three-time world champion, although no major boxing organization has yet sanctioned a championship for women.

Martin is also a pioneer. She will face Sue Chase tonight at the MGM Grand in a bout that will be telecast nationally by Showtime, marking the first time a women’s match has been shown to a national audience. The fight is on the undercard of a show that feature International Boxing Federation welterweight champion Felix Trinidad against Rodney Moore in the main event. Also on the card will be heavyweight Tommy Morrison against Arthur Weathers.

Martin is proud of her role as a leader of the women’s movement into the ring.

“I don’t see anybody else getting the recognition that I do,” she said. “People are coming out of the woodwork to fight me. Everybody wants to fight Christy Martin.”

Martin was hardly so enthusiastic the first time she entered the ring. A coal miner’s daughter, her sport in high school and at Concord College in Athens, W.Va., was basketball.

One night, Martin and several college classmates attended a local tough-woman contest. Martin’s friends dared her to participate.

She took the dare and a career was launched.

That night, Martin found herself fighting Sue McNamara, a classmate in anatomy at Concord.

“That made it very tough,” Martin said.

But not tough enough to lose. Martin won the match and $1,000, and she decided she liked the feel of boxing gloves on her hands.

She turned professional and fought in such organizations as Women’s Combat Sports International and the Women’s World Boxing Assn. before she was finally sent to her future husband for training.

“I was a male chauvinist,” Jim now says. “I didn’t want women in my gym. I didn’t want a woman who thought she was a man.”

But after seeing how sincere Christy was, Jim decided he’d hold off on having her ribs broken. For at least a few days.

“I found that she worked harder than most of my fighters,” Jim said. “Instead of getting rid of her, I saw we could make some money with her.”

Although they can’t agree on who made the first romantic move, they were married in 1992.

Since then, Martin has fought her way into the spotlight by developing her technical skills and a devastating knockout punch.

“People can’t believe I generate the power that I do,” she said.

Along the way, Martin has fought some fierce battles. There was Pat Watts, a 256-pounder with a gold tooth. Martin disposed of Watts, tooth and all, in one round.

And there was Andrea Deshong, the only opponent to ever stymie Martin. Deshong handed Martin both her losses, on a three-round decision in 1988 and a five-round decision in 1989. Martin finally decisioned Deshong in a five-round match in 1990.

So what’s ahead for Martin? She wants to keep fighting, expects to cash in on the endorsement market from her position in the sports world and is hoping that one of the major boxing organizations will finally recognize female boxing. Martin said she has been promised by World Boxing Council President Jose Sulaiman that something will be done, but nothing has yet happened.

If the sentiments of Chuck Williams, a WBC official, are any indication, nothing will happen.

“I wasn’t brought up to see two women punch each other in the face,” said Williams, who made it plain he was speaking only for himself and not for the WBC.

“She [Martin] has very good technical skills. I’m not detracting from those skills. But I was not brought up to be a part of something like this.”

Promoter Bob Arum is another boxing figure who has yet to be convinced that women belong in the ring.

“Fifteen years ago, one of the networks showed an Indian girl fighting a girl who was a blackjack dealer,” he said. “The blackjack dealer got hit in the nose and started crying. I said, ‘Forget this.’ ”

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Trinidad (27-0, 23 knockouts), will be making his eighth title defense. He has knocked out his last four opponents, 13 of his last 14, and does not figure to have much trouble with Moore (37-9-2, 19 KOs).

Morrison (45-3-1, 39 KOs) will be making his first ring appearance since getting knocked out by Lennox Lewis in October. Weathers (22-8-1, 18 KOs), is also coming off a defeat, having lost a 10-round decision to Mike Hunter in November. Weathers has had only two fights in the last three years.

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Boxing Notes

With the George Foreman-Michael Moorer match, planned for New York’s Madison Square Garden, off, plans are under way instead for a heavyweight tripleheader in that building on May 10. Evander Holyfield against James Toney would be the main event. Lennox Lewis against Ray Mercer, and Tim Witherspoon against Long Beach heavyweight Jeremy Williams would also be on the card. . . . Monday’s show at the Forum will feature a North American Boxing Organization title fight between junior-featherweight champion Jesse Magana (16-4-2, eight knockouts) a winner of five in a row, and challenger Freddy Cruz (49-8-7, 16 KOs). Also on the card will be 19-year-old junior-featherweight Nestor Garza, who is 18-0 with 17 knockouts, against Julio Cesar Cardona (24-10, 17 KOs). . . . On Thursday, Jorge Paez will finally make it into the Olympic Auditorium ring. Paez, the former, two-time IBF featherweight champion, had been scheduled to fight last month, but had to drop out because of a cut hand. Now healed, Paez (56-10-4, 36 KOs) will face Paris Alexander (20-8-3, eight KOs).