Eddie Futch, 90; Boxer Turned to Training Champion Fighters

Boxing trainer Eddie Futch, teacher of champion fighters and a respected figure in an often seamy sport for seven decades, died Wednesday morning in Las Vegas. He was 90.

The Clark County coroner’s office would divulge no more details pending a further examination today.

“In a business riddled with politics and intrigue,” said promoter Bob Arum, “Eddie never got involved in any of that. He always appeared to be above it. You won’t find anybody who has anything bad to say about him. In boxing, that’s amazing.”

Futch was born in Hillsboro, Miss., in 1911 but he grew up in Detroit, in the tough Black Bottom neighborhood.

As an amateur, Futch sparred with future heavyweight great Joe Louis in a Detroit gym in the 1930s. Despite winning a Golden Gloves lightweight championship, Futch himself never turned professional, instead devoting himself to working the corners of dozens of pro fighters, including 20 champions.

Futch trained five heavyweight champions: Larry Holmes, Joe Frazier, Riddick Bowe, Michael Spinks and Trevor Berbick. Among his other titleholders were light heavyweights Bob Foster and Montell Griffin, junior middleweight Mike McCallum, lightweight Alexis Arguello, and welterweights Marlon Starling and Don Jordan.

When one of his fighters excelled, it was said the fighter had the Futch Touch.

But many say Futch’s greatest moment came in a championship match his fighter lost.

It was the 1975 “Thrilla in Manila,” between Frazier and Muhammad Ali. In a brutal struggle, Ali seemed on the edge of defeat in the 11th round. But he somehow found a reservoir of strength to carry the match through 14 rounds.

With a round to go, it was Frazier who was in serious trouble. Futch looked into the face of his fighter, sitting on his stool, and saw two eyes battered nearly shut.

Although Frazier wanted nothing more than to beat his archrival, Futch stopped the fight.

“I thought, ‘He’s a good father and I want him to see his kids grow up,’ ” Futch later said.

“With Eddie,” said Marc Ratner, executive director of the Nevada State Athletic Commission, “it was always about the fighter. It was never about money.”

Futch showed that with Bowe. Although he felt Bowe had the potential to be the best of his era, Futch walked out on him when Bowe wouldn’t stay in shape.

Fighters quickly learned that Futch would be in their corner only as long as they paid attention.

“Marlon,” he once told Starling, “I’ve taught you all you know. But I haven’t taught you all I know.”

Futch officially retired four years ago. But he didn’t really.

“I would ask him about fighters all the time,” Arum said. “In the last 20 years, it didn’t appear that he aged at all. He was still sharp mentally. He would come to news conferences and weigh-ins even though he had no connection to the fighters. But he still had a love of boxing.”

Futch also remained a familiar figure on fight nights in Las Vegas.

“He lived right up to the end,” Ratner said. “He didn’t work the corners because it was hard for him to get up into the ring. But he was always sitting there ringside.”