Boxing is getting punched out

BY MICHAEL DOBIE | STAFF CORRESPONDENT

ANGOLA, La. - Shafts of early morning light pierced the gloom in long diagonal lines as the smell of sweat slowly filled the dank prison gym.

Seven men were scattered around the concrete floor, stretching, doing sit-ups, pounding heavy bags hanging from basketball rims, checking themselves in the cracks of two ancient mirrors.

Inside the ropes of the gray canvas ring, Hasan Henderson threw punches at Wilfred Smith, a trainer with the boxing team at the Louisiana State Penitentiary in Angola. Straight jabs, powerful hooks, quick combinations. Smith deflected them as he talked to his fellow inmate.

"C'mon now, get quick," Smith said. "C'mon, yeah."

Smith carefully watched Henderson, who was focused on Smith's mitts.

"Go," Smith said.

He pursed his lips tightly as Henderson battered the mitts.

"Work," Smith said, bouncing on his toes. "Not bad, try again."

Sweat poured down Henderson's face.

"Again," Smith said. "Again."

Henderson was preparing for an upcoming fight at another Louisiana prison. But when he climbed down from the ring, a different battle was on his mind. The heavyweight champ of the Louisiana prison system wants to get out and fight professionally someday.

"Every move I make is ways and means in order for me to achieve it," Henderson said. "I look at Roy Jones, I see Evander Holyfield, the greats coming down, and I feel like I'm supposed to be amongst them. I feel like my name, I'm supposed to be bringing myself up like that and fighting James Toney in that division for that cruiserweight belt. I feel like that's supposed to be for me. I feel like I'm supposed to be right there. I feel like I'm the last of a dying breed."

In a way, he is.

Organized boxing is virtually non-existent in U.S. prisons, a startling decline for the sport that has produced more post-prison success stories than any other.

World middleweight champ Bernard Hopkins boxed in Pennsylvania prisons. Michael Bennett, captain of the 2000 U.S. Olympic boxing team, learned to box in prison in Illinois. Fighters from Sonny Liston to Dwight Muhammad Qawi came out of prison and had successful professional careers.

Shortly after World War II, nearly half the states offered organized boxing in their prisons. New Jersey had a renowned program; in the late 1970s, NBC televised fights of top-ranked light-heavyweight contender James Scott from inside Rahway State Prison. Eddie Cotton, who refereed the Mike Tyson-Lennox Lewis heavyweight title bout, learned his trade working New Jersey prison fights.

Now, the handful of Louisiana prisons with boxing teams might be the last prison practitioners of the sport. Montana eliminated its boxing program in April because of budget cuts and concerns about medical liability. Other states, including New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and Pennsylvania, canceled their programs largely during the 1990s. Many states subscribe to the theory expressed by Doug Kulmacz, director of recreation services for the Connecticut prison system: "We've tried to de-emphasize that thuggy, grunt, pugilistic background that was in our past."

And yet, echoes linger. Three heavy bags hang from ceiling girders in the gym in Rahway, now called East Jersey State Prison. A speed bag gets a regular workout from inmates at Eastern Correctional Facility in upstate New York. John Tumminia, recreation supervisor at upstate Shawangunk, said boxing would be the maximum security prison's second most popular sport if it was offered.

"They've been asking me for it since '86," Tumminia said, referring to the year he arrived at Shawangunk.

"I just would like to see guys in New York and Pennsylvania compete in boxing," said Smith, the Angola trainer. "Even if you have no other viable opportunities in prison, like vocational, stuff like that, if you can become a pretty good boxer in prison I think that you can go out on the street and earn a living."