By Mitch Abramson
“Very few fighters have anything after their careers are done because they don't do anything during their formative years to prepare themselves for life after boxing. They don't return to school or learn a trade. They are so used to making big purses and having money all the time that when they stop fighting all they do is lay around the house and do nothing, and the years go by and soon they end up with nothing.”Joe Louis worked as an official greeter at a Las Vegas casino after his fighting days were over. Former light heavyweight champion Matthew Saad Mahammad had little if anything to show for his stellar career. And in the early 20th century Young Griffo, a featherweight from Australia with more than 100 fights, used to sleep on 42nd Street in his later days. The modern example is, of course, Mike Tyson, who managed to squander $300 million in earnings and recently filed for bankruptcy to deal with his creditors.Tyson's management team had put together an ambitious fight schedule to get him back on his feet, but his knockout loss to Danny Williams a couple of weeks ago basically scuttled those plans and once again reinforced the notion that fighters always end up losing the shirts on their back.”Name a fighter and he's probably broke,” said fight agent Johnny Bos.When Tony Mazzarella, treasurer of Ring 8, an organization that helps former fighters get back on their feet, learned that former welterweight champion Kid Gavilan, who died in February of last year at the age of 77, was buried without a headstone to distinguish his grave from the next, Mazzarella, who was in Miami eating dinner with Kaplan at the time, nearly dropped his fork.”He was a great champion, and he made such a huge contribution to boxing,” said Mazzarella, who owns the Waterfront Crabhouse in Long Island City, where Ring 8 meets every month. “Everybody deserves a proper burial, but for a world champion to basically be buried in a potter's field-type setting is terrible. He was the type of fighter I used to watch on TV growing up. We owed it to him, and Ring 8 never turns its back on no one.”The matter was more complicated then simply buying a new headstone for the Cuban bolo puncher. Gavilan died penniless with no family to speak of and was buried in an underprivileged section of the Lady of Mercy Cemetery in Miami that did not allow headstones. Ring 8, which had done something like this before when it helped buy a headstone for the fighter Tammy Mauriello, not only had to foot the bill for a gravestone but would also have to pay to dig him up and rebury him in a more affluent section.So Mazzarella, a former catcher at Grover Cleveland High School, rounded up the troops to collect donations and one day last June when he was going through his mail, got a check for $5,000 from an unlikely source.”Mike Tyson sent us the money,” said Mazzarella, who was raised in Maspeth. “Can you believe it?” A member of Ring 8 told Tyson about the mission. At first he was trying to solicit funds from Don King or some other big wig in the business, but Tyson cut him off and offered to make a contribution on the condition that no media be notified. He should have known better. The boxing Web site Fightnews.com was the first to report Tyson's donation. “Knowing what Mike is going through financially, it was a really nice gesture,” Mazzarella said. “He was the only big-name fighter out there who gave any money, and there are fighters who have plenty of money who could have given a little something if they wanted to. Maybe the word hasn't gotten out yet. Tyson is the type of guy that doesn't do things for publicity. He's just a very generous person who was trying to help out his peers.” Say what you want about Tyson, but the man has always had a love affair with the history of boxing, starting with when he used to watch fight films in the Catskills with Cus D'Amato. Shelly Finkel, Tyson's manager, also sent a check for $500.”This project definitely hit a chord with me and Mike,” Finkel said last week. It's easy to play armchair psychologist and guess why Tyson found the room in his heart and in his wallet to make a donation. As a fighter who never met a dollar he couldn't spend, maybe he empathized with Gavilan's situation. After his fighting days were over, Gavilan hoped to return to home a conquering hero, but when he arrived, found that Cuba's leader, Fidel Castro, had repossessed his belongings, leaving him with virtually nothing. Eventually, Gavilan escaped to the United States where he tried to carve out a niche as a boxing trainer, but his second career never took off, and with no steady income or family to help him out, died broke and buried by the state.The subject of Gavilan's plight was kept mostly secret until Kaplan told Mazzarella at dinner. Since then Ring 8, which once paid $10,000 worth of dental work for one of its members, has been throwing money at the project. Bill Tate, an ex-fighter in the Chicago Hall of Fame, forked over $1,000 for the cause; it seemed Gavilan's death and the irreverent way he was buried struck a nerve with Ring 8's crew.”Gavilan came to a couple meetings,” said the president of Ring 8, Bobby Bartels, who was raised in Astoria and is stepping down from his post in December. “He was so nice and kind with the club. He signed autographs and chatted with everybody. It's so nice to see guys like these. That's what these meetings are for.””Gavilan was a great fighter and a great man,” Kaplan added. “Men like these should not be forgotten. For all the fighters who came after him, they should pay their respects. He's a part of history.”Ring 8 is still collecting donations. The members have cleared the first hurdle of paying for the headstone but are still raising money for the excavation. Checks can be mailed to: VBA Ring 8, 2-03 Borden Ave., Long Island City, NY 11101. For more information, call 718-729-4862. Reach reporter Mitch Abramson by e-mail at TimesLedger@aol.com or call 718-229-0300 Ext. 130.
