?This is fighting. This is a different type of activity than, you know, playing baseball or going out and having a softball team. This is different, we have people that are? this is the hurt business! And in the hurt business people get hurt. And we are trying to protect them from being unnecessarily harmed by things that they have no control over if we don?t take care of it as a regulatory body.??Big John McCarthy
?Longtime reporter Joe Falls (attending his first fight in years) was horrified at the carnage and in a column referred to the fight as a bloodletting by the river,? wrote Lindy Lindell in the 2001 book ?Images of Sports?Metro Detroit Boxing? on Leo ?Kid? Saenz?s March 02, 1980 fight with Mickey Goodwin. Lindell would go on to state, ?Goodwin hammered the outgunned Leo Saenz at Joe Lewis Arena for ten rounds until the fight was finally stopped in the tenth and final round.? Kid can be seen on page 86 just after eating a left hand from middleweight boxer Mickey Goodwin. Just three years prior, Saenz was listed in the March 1977 issue of The Ring magazine as the #10 middleweight in the world according to boxrec.com.
In episode two of legendary mixed martial arts referee Big John McCarthy and Sean Wheelock?s December 09, 2015 podcast ?Let?s Get it On!? Big John elaborated on the damage mixed martial arts fighters face in comparison to their boxing counterparts.
?MMA is more violent, but I will tell you that boxing is more damaging. Overall, if you look at the sport boxing is incredibly damaging, because we really only have two targets that we attack. And 90% of the fighters go after the head 90% of the time. And so, we have just concussive blows to our head happening over and over and over and over again. Our brain is the most important element that we have and so, if you?re going to say what?s the most damaging between all the sports, it would be boxing.?
?Yeah, I fully agree. Pugilistic dementia. A lot of people say Parkinson?s disease,? added McCarthy?s cohost Sean Wheelock. According to a June 10, 2016 cbsnews.com article by Jonathan Lapook titled, ?Doctor who diagnosed Muhammad Ali with Parkinson?s Speaks Out?, ?the biggest battle of Muhammad Ali?s life was his battle with Parkinson?s disease.?
In an August 24, 2017 cbssports.com article titled, ?Study: Muhammad Ali showed signs of Parkinson?s before retirement, diagnosis,? author Kevin Skiver wrote, ?Muhammad Ali battled Parkinson?s disease his entire post-boxing life. A new study, however, shows that Ali?s bout with Parkinson?s started well before he was diagnosed with it.? According to Skiver:
The study found that Ali?s speech slowed by 16 percent after a 15-round bout with Ernie Shavers in 1977. Shavers, a brawler, landed 266 punches throughout the fight. Ali?s speech normalized over time, but Eig?s study, conducted by Arizona State speech scientists Visar Berisha and Julie Liss through CompuBox, Inc., found a downward trend in Ali?s speech in the waning years of his career.
For every Muhammad Ali in professional boxing, there are countless other pugilists who have suffered similar fates or worse that the mainstream media outlets will scarcely report on. In most cases, these athletes will have been compensated very little for their life altering sacrifices to fight in front of fight fans who will soon forget all about the matches and the combatants themselves. But while memories of fighters and careers long since passed ultimately fade from the public?s collective consciousness, the effects of a career marked by repeated blows to the head remain for those who participated in combat sports.
?The CDC defines traumatic brain injury (TBI) as a disruption in the normal function of the brain that can be caused by a bump, blow, or a jolt to the head, or penetrating head injury. Everyone is as risk for TBI, especially children and adults,? according to the cdc.gov website. ?Dementia Pugilistica is a form of dementia that poses a serious long-term threat to individuals involved in contact-heavy sports, or who have sustained multiple concussions throughout their lives,? writes dementia.org, who goes on to state sufferers of dementia pugilistica experience difficulty in speech, short-term memory loss, progressively declining mental ability and pathological feelings of jealousy or paranoia among many other negative side effects associated with Parkinson?s disease, dementia pugilistica, traumatic brain injury etc.
The sacrifices these fighters make to chase dreams, entertain fans and maybe put a few dollars in their pocket do not just end when the lights go out and the fans go home. There is an accumulative effect that builds over time that results in life long struggles for many of these athletes while the public living vicariously through these fighters escape the realities and consequences of a career marked by repeated concussive blows to the head. Many of these athletes turn to substance abuse and will display a pattern of behavioral issues which are rarely taken into account or put into their proper context for what they actually are, dementia pugilistica. The results of a career in combat sports, entertaining fan?s for pennies on the dollar, exploited at nearly every level of the sport while everyone else profits from their sacrifices.
In an accomplishment most athletes dream of, Saenz was featured on page 38 of the March 4, 1974 Sports Illustrated magazine article, ?On the Block: The Way of all Flesh,? written by John Schulian. Captioned in the table of contents, the article is described as, ?Baltimore?s lurid strip is fading, leaving behind boxers rehearsing for shows at the bucket of blood.? The article describes ?Kid? as one of fourteen children from Edinburg, Texas who later moved to Kalamazoo, Michigan. ?Relentlessly aggressive, Leo is always hunting them. Trainer Terry Moore remembers Leo?s reaction to one of the five decisions he has won. ?Leo kept saying, ?I gotta knock him out, I gotta knock him out,? I said, ?Leo, you already done punched holes in the man,? He said, ?I know, but I gotta knock him out.??
?This guy,? Eli (Hanover) says of the kid, ?is the best fighter I seen in the past 30 years potential-wise. If he don?t become a champion, it?s because he didn?t try. He can be what you?d call your Rolls-Royce of boxing.?
?Trained by the legendary Heine Blaustein. Leo ?Kid? Saenz, a middleweight whose career spanned from 1973 to 1981, fought almost all his matches locally. Emile Griffith, Mustafa Hamsho, Jimmy Savage and Willie Mack are some of the good men he boxed,? reads page 122 of the book ?Baltimore?s Boxing Legacy: 1893-2003? by Thomas Scharf. Published in a July 22nd, 1975 ?The Capital? newspaper article by Mike Klahr titled, ?Young Boxer Forsakes Old Hero George Foreman: Severna Park?s John Wilburn Follows Frazier,? Saenz?s main event fight with ?former great champion Emile Griffith? was announced as the Capital Center main event.
In the world of boxing, getting the honor to step in the ring with a fighter of Griffith?s caliber and going the distance, even in defeat, is something to hang your hat on. As written in the book ?The Boxing Register: International Boxing Hall of Fame Official Record Book? by James B. Roberts and Alexander G. Skutt the following can be found on the legendary Emile Griffith:
?Though knocked down early, Griffith controlled the fight and by the twelfth round was in such command that he blasted (Benny) Paret along the ropes with multiple punches before referee Ruby Goldstein stopped him. Paret died soon after the fight as a result of his beating and residual damage by his previous opponent, Gene Fullmer. Parget?s death wore heavily on Griffith. ?I would have quit, he said later, ?but I didn?t know how to do anything else but fight.?
Though ?Kid? would come up short against the legendary Emile Griffith, losing a 10 round unanimous decision, his reputation was cemented as a pugilist who commands respect in the ring. The hype was real with ?The Mexican Warrior? as ?Kid? Saenz was also known.
Prior to fighting Emile Griffith (85-24-2), Saenz had a pair of fights with ?Irish? Mike Baker. Another great boxer whose name, like Saenz, has been lost to the sands of time to the casual boxing fan.
?It seems like ancient history when Baker (45-21-3) was considered one of the world?s premier junior middleweights, good enough to challenge Maurice Hope for the title in 1979,? writes Allen Goldstein in his article titled, ?Baker in the ring again at 43, says worst is behind him? published on May 12, 1995 for the Baltimore Sun.
Goldstein would go on to write:
A clever boxer with extremely quick hands, the South Carolina native attracted the attention of the late Edward Bennett Williams and Washington Redskins coach George Allen, who took over his management after he scored an impressive victory over rugged Leo Saenz of Baltimore at the Capital Centre in 1975. ?Knowledgeable boxing guys were calling me the best white fighter to come along since the ?50s,? he said.
?I?ve been in there with some fantastic, unbelievable, brick-through-the-wall punchers, and guys who could knock you dead. But I always finished that fight,? recounted Baker in the April 22, 2007 article, ?Granite Jaw: Bob-and-weave style helped take Upstate fighter across the world,? at goupstate.com by Sean Flynn.
Flynn would go on to write:
In 1975, Washingtonian Magazine noted Baker?s heart, congeniality and his baby face while describing a pair of memorable fights against Leo ?Kid? Saenz. Baker is, ?more clean-cut than a Boy Scout,? the piece said. ?He gives the impression that the worst thing he?s ever done in his life was help an old lady across the street.?
Baker defeated Saenz for the 1975 United States junior middleweight title by unanimous decision, losing the rematch to Saenz just two months later. According to Flynn, ?After losing the second of the two 1975 fights against Saenz at the Capital Centre in Landover, Md., Baker was despondent and frustrated, but he had caught the eye of one important person who was ringside for the Saenz fights. Redskins owner Edward Bennett Williams contacted Baker, and soon after, Cline sold the contract to Williams for $10,000.? In a story straight out of Hollywood, at your lowest moment in the depths of despair, in steps a professional football team owner who see?s something in the young pugilist that he believes he can help mold into a better version of himself.
?Redskins president Edward Bennett Williams and head coach George Allen thought Baker could benefit from the team?s training techniques and resources,? according to a goupstate.com article from April 7, 2001 titled, ?Carolina?s Boxing Hall of Fame Inducts Baker? by Robert Neely. It?s truly the stuff dreams are made of and reminiscent of Rocky IV, where a boxer is brought under a state-of-the-art strength and conditioning regimen.
Neely would go on to write:
Baker beat Leo Saenz for the United States junior middleweight title in 1975, holding it for two years, and had a world title fight in London. Baker was a boxer, but he spent three years under contract to the NFL?s Washington Redskins. Redskins president Edward Bennett Williams and head coach George Allen thought Baker would benefit from the team?s training techniques and resources. So they bought the boxer?s contract. Baker trained with the team. He became close with Williams, even house-sitting the renowned lawyer?s mansion on the Potomac River. The fighter also became close with the players. He worked out with many of them, including Hall of Fame running back John Riggins and quarterback Joe Theismann. Baker bought out his contract with the Redskins after his lone title fight, against WBC super welterweight champion Maurice Hope in London in September 1979.
Curiously, Neely writes Baker beat Saenz for the US junior middleweight title and retained it for two years though Baker lost a rematch to Saenz just two months later. Obviously, there must have been extenuating circumstances surrounding the rematch and the title must not have been on the line or Baker would not have been able to retain the belt for as long as he is reported to have done and Leo ?Kid? Saenz would have been the new United States junior middleweight champion. Neely goes on to write that Baker is remembered as, ?one of the elite boxers South Carolina has produced and one of the handful that fought for a world title.? The article goes on to mention Baker was inducted into the Washington, D.C. Boxing Hall of Fame in 1995 in addition to the Carolinas Boxing Hall of Fame induction in 2001.
By the time Saenz had fought Mickey Goodwin, ?Kid? Saenz?s career was nearing the end of the road. Saenz hadn?t won a fight since November 1978 against Archie Andrews and ?Kid? was on a three-fight losing streak prior to the ?bloodletting by the river.? The beginning of the end for Saenz coming at the hands of the great Mustafa Hamsho who stopped Saenz in the sixth round by TKO in their July 17, 1979 match at Steel Pier Arena in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Hamsho ?may have been the second-best middleweight in the world in the late 1970?s through the mid 1980?s. The ?Hagler Era.? He was twice defeated by the Marvelous one in title fights but no one other than Hagler could seem to handle him,? writes Jim Amato in his gloves gone by article titled, ?Mustafa Hamsho: If Not for Marv?? at myboxingfans.com.
Catching up with Saenz many years later, ?Kid? immediately recalled the fight with Hamsho and explained he had been drinking wine the night prior to the Hamsho fight. This could explain Saenz?s lethargy in the ring that night, with the fight announcers regularly mentioning Saenz?s inability to get going in the fight and Hamsho repeatedly beating him the punch. Saenz was taken behind the woodshed that night, though he displayed a remarkable chin in the face of a relentless offensive onslaught. ?Kid? would go on to lose his next five bouts before finally retiring, his career never the same after the beating he took in the Hamsho fight.
There is a heavy price to be paid for a career in combat sports, whether its pugilistic dementia or Parkinson?s disease. Traumatic brain injury is a very real possibility for those who were professional combat sport athletes. Life is forever altered for these men and women, the sacrifices made for the public?s entertainment very real. For many of them, the tradeoff for glory in their youth will mean a less than graceful exit in their golden years which will by marked by debilitating physical and mental disabilities. There is an endless list of fighters who made tremendous sacrifices for the sports entertainment industry, each with a precious life and story to tell. Most destined to be lost to the sands of time, but not this one. If you do not respect what these athletes have sacrificed you will never be able to respect the nature of combat sports themselves.
