The Greatest Knockout Artist
of All Time: ALCOHOL
Part II
A few years back when I helped induct him into The El Paso Boxing/Martial Arts Hall of Fame, he was in dire straits, living in squalor and downing cheap wine. Thankfully, his daughter and son-in-law have helped make his life a tad better than miserable.
A fellow friend once told me that it is good that so many of our hero’s die young so that we don’t have to witness their agonizing disgrace and poverty when they age. Perhaps he read too many stories of Roman Gladiators and their heroic life if they won their battles of death. I doubt if any lived long enough to enjoy a pension or old age.
As for Chucho (real name Jesus Castillo Aguilera), he wasn’t into the heavy party scene as were so many famous Mexican fighters. He would go on to live a clean and decent life. His hard-partying friend, World Bantamweight Champion Ruben Olivares (1969-72), was fortunate for years doing the party scene. In fact, he would become a famous bandleader in his middle years.
Argentine born world champion, Carlos Monzon, would also become a living legend as he avoided heavy alcohol use and became a sharp scriptwriter and film producer in his native country. He used his good wit to become a top businessman as well. The great Californian champion, featherweight Manny Ortiz, was another who didn’t beat booze but had his share and died too young. He lived to age fifty-four dying from cirrhosis of the liver.
Then there was the first ever world champion from Columbia, Jr. Welterweight Antonio Cervantes Reyes, aka ‘Kid Pambele’. Would his boxing fame lead him to succumb to the fast life and alcohol poisoning? Yes and no. Reportedly, he is a great champion to praise but not to emulate. It is known that he was a good bar client but claims that he was hooked on the white stuff are not substantiated. Claims he is busted are likely true. In the year 2000 Columbia named him as that country’s greatest boxer of the century. But what about the youngest man in history to win a world championship, Wilfred Benitez? Sorry, his life and deeds in the ring are the stuff legends are made of and he is a legend in his own lifetime. However, the rest of his story is like walking through an endless, filthy, stinking, gutter.
May it always be remembered that it was Wilfred Benitez’ mercuric rise to boxing championship fame as a seventeen year old that set an all-time record low age for any champion. The baby-faced battler was an efficient, talented, and powerful boxer. His early record was against cream puffs but when a WBA light welterweight title opportunity on March 6th, 1976 against Antonio ‘Kid Pembele’ Cervantes was offered, he took it and he also took a split decision from Cervantes in one of San Jan Puerto Rico’s greatest contested fights. The young dynamo would go on to win two more world titles. On January 14, 1979 he won the WBC Welterweight Championship with a brutal fight against Carlos Palomino. Then on May 23rd, 1981, the talented youngster won the WBC Super Welterweight Championship by dominating Maurice Hope. He wasn’t only famous, he was becoming rich. He also had his girlfriends and did his partying. He even married and had children, but only for a couple of years. What he didn’t understand was his sport and its dangers to his health; nor did he understand the contribution heavy partying contributes to the mix. And imagine if you can - he didn’t understand his greedy manager, his own father, Gregorio. Add it all up and what do you get? Screwed, screwed for life.
In a weird, fateful turn of events, Benitez would hit rock bottom just as quickly as he reached fame. He started having brain problems (dementia pugilistica) while still fighting but couldn’t retire as he was to discover that the millions he entrusted to his manager father had been squandered on horses, booze, gambling and partying.
By 1986 Benitez was on the skids and lost to Canada’s Matthew Hilton by KO in nine rounds and an absolute nobody in the fight game, Carlos Herrera, of Salta, Argentina, earned a TKO over the former master in seven rounds. That wasn’t the rest of the story. After the fight, the promoter skipped and Benitez wasn’t paid. He was destitute but not a soul would give him aid or solace. Believe it or not, he had no money for fare home. He was homeless and busted broke in Salta. Nobody in the states would help either. What became even more demeaning was that in order to survive, Benitez had to resort to begging while babbling incoherently on the streets of Salta. This had to be the most disgraceful time of his life; the most disrespected time of his shining career. The former champ who was once a king was now a pauper. Memories of defeating undefeated Carlos Santos in 1981 and Roberto Duran in 1982 for the WBC Light Middleweight title were just that now, just memories. Why it was nearly two years before help arrived and he went home.
Food, lodging, and other expenses got so bad at home in Carolina, Puerto Rico, that Benitez, out of cash, out of shape and suffering from brain disease, made the desperate decision to fight again. It was another of his blundering mistakes. From March of 1990 through September of that year, he engaged in four fights against newcomers and won two and lost two. He took hundreds of punches to his head and body which just about equaled what he was paid. He already had slurred speech to go along with advanced dementia. His boxing career and was over and his brain disease advancing. Soon, he was partially paralyzed, partially blind and living a wretched life with his older mother as nurse and caretaker. He couldn’t even walk without her help and she was tearful when the country finally institutionalized Benitez at the San Agustin Nursing Home with fifteen other inmates. However, he was such a problem that the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico arranged for his release and a hero’s pension of some $1300-1400 a month, not near enough to pay for him and his mother to remain in a two bedroom run down shack and all the necessary utilities, medical and other expenses. His mother Clara, over eighty years old in 2007, worries about who will help the forty-nine year old helpless Benitez after she passes on. She can’t pay all her utilities and has to do without electricity at times. She once sold part of her roof to pay her utility bills. His swindling father passed away in 1996. At least Benitez didn’t get into heavy drinking but can we say the same for Wilfredo ‘Bazooka’ Gomez?
Wilfredo Gomez was born in Puerto Rico, unlike Wilfred Benitez who had been born in New York and later moved to Puerto Rico. Gomez wanted out of his blighted Las Monjas San Juan, Puerto Rico neighborhood and boxing was his way out. After a highly successful amateur career (96-3), he turned pro and with his devastating punching power (rated 13th best of all time by Ring Magazine) literally shot to fame and fortune. He was given the nickname ‘Bazooka’ for the best of reasons; he could knock your block off. His punching power is estimated to have been as strong as one being hit by a bowling ball at some 20 mph. He really was a top gun and in boxing that usually means an eventual shot at a title. And it came to pass on May 21st 1977 when WBC super bantamweight champion, Dong Kyun Yum (50-2-6), believed it appropriate to give the upstart youngster an old fashioned beating in his own backyard.
The money was right and Dong was ready to stand and deliver. Within thirty seconds of the first round, he downed Gomez with a powerful combo and it looked like a short evening was in store for Gomez and the hopeful crowd. Not so fast, Gomez had ‘guts’ and ‘balls’ as well as a powerful punch and he gutted out the round and the next few before taking over the fight from Dong, withering him down with volley after volley of combinations, especially body shots.
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