During the roll in Mexico in the winter of 1993, the great Robbie Davies was in Ringside in his Blazer from the games of the Nations Community. Behind the scenes, in a frigid room used by the student Matadors, Andy Holligan was preparing to fight the hero of all Mexico, Julio Cesar Chavez, for the title of WBC a delicate beef weight. There was no need for bookmakers.

At night, when he approached the ring, the fans were focused on the cheapest seats – not seats, only concrete slabs – around fires burning metal drums. I saw high flames, whenever someone spitted his lips full of beers in barrels. It was a vision of hell from my unthreatening seat, but Holligan had a sedate choice and knew exactly what he signed. “I’m not stupid, I’m fighting a living legend,” he said on Wednesday.

Davies threw his blows, screaming, delighted and dived during the fight. He was a man completely devoid of any concept of fear, that is. He was an ideal travel companion, and he just added a tight, tight blazer to its appearance.

It was a lost and painful cause, and at the end of the fifth round Arthur Mercante, the iconic judge, went to the corner of Holligan. Mercante told Colin Moorcroft: “I think this fight should end.” Moorcroft and Frank Warren pulled out Holligan. It was the perfect break. Chavez moved to 89 wins that night and without failures.

A few days before the fight, there was a run on the streets of Puebly with Chavez, a plain idea in which the Master of Mexico escaped, and thousands would go up to him and down the cobbled streets. It was an elevator from Rocky and there would be stray dogs, boys with shoes, jovial teenagers, cameras and publicity. It made sense; Brief gear, nice photos, and then a word with an idol. However, it turns out that I had the right attitude, but at the wrong height. At 7200 feet I finished after 10 minutes, catching my breath, sweating, fighting and drinking water, hallucinating on the stairs of the restaurant, which gave me chicken with chocolate last night. This is a local delicacy. The run was not nice and the chicken was not for me.

After returning to Maison Del Exportion, a great fight hotel, in which the management increased by prices by about 300 percent without any warning, in the Michael Nunn camp there was an augment in the crisis; The master was bulky, very bulky. He was in the steam room and went out, he looked exhausted and dangerously close to falling. It was a regular thing from Nunn, which had six feet and vast. And he lacked discipline.

The state of Nunna led to one of the largest lines of Don King, a wicked mixture of joke, grain and placement of the product. One day, on the edge of the pool, King was asked about Nunna’s problems with weight and could he recover on Saturday’s fight against Merqui Sos about Super-Middleight WBA.

“Sure, Nunn can soak his balls in frosty crowns,” King said as he pulled a bottle from a bucket of ice, water drips over his Safari suit. It was perfect. Nunn won, beating the sauce at points to keep his title. This was his last victory in the fight for the title of Master and only his last battle with Scales. By the way, Sosa is one of the bravest and the most fearless people I’ve ever seen live.

Hector Camacho and Oliver McCall were also on a long account; They were not guests in the same hotel. I can only imagine a party that I missed tardy at night somewhere in Puebla. I chose a reasonable tardy evening, found somewhere to eat and a place where competing Mariachi teams would sing a lullaby for almost every warrior you asked. It cost a few pesos to hear glory in their words and observe their actions. They tell the story of the fight; They put on imaginary bandages, go to the ring, touch the gloves and tell the action. These hypnotizing, and these wonderful, emotional songs should be called Boxeocorrido, the boxing version of the infamous Narcocorrido ballads, those devoted to drug traders and killers. I have no idea if Nunn, Camacho and McCall have their own catalog.

So many elderly, king’s elderly bills in the nineties had hidden jewels. In Puebla Derrick James, coach Errola Spence, moved to eight and zero, winning with the legendary Irishman of Danny Morgan. In the next fight for the title of world champion Terry Norris was knocked out by Simon Brown for the title of WBC Featherlight-Middle. Norris and Brown is the main event in any language.

It was a arduous, arduous night for Andy Holligan in this distant and hostile place. Chavez was full of respect after the fight, not calling Holligan “a coward, a bitch, a dog”, just like with Greg Haugen at the beginning of the year. By the way, Chavez fought six times in 1993, which includes a draw with Pernell Whitaker. In fact, he fought in Juarez six weeks before the fight in Holligan. It sounds like a warrior of the fifties, not very current.

Chavez would lose for the first time in the next fight, divided into Frankie Randall on MGM in Las Vegas. His troubles started away from the ring.

Holligan was then a British champion and lost for the first time in 22 fights; Only six months later he was beaten by Ross Hale, losing his British title.

Nunn lost his way after Puebla. In the process of having cocaine in 2003, it was claimed that in 1993 there was a year in which he developed a cocaine problem – it was, unfortunately, probably earlier. He was sentenced in 2003 to a stunning 24 years in prison for paying a secret agent of 200 bucks for cocaine; He walked for free in August 2019.

McCall had its demons for years, Camacho is dead. Don King met Mike Tyson again last week in Florida. In Mexico, they are still singing songs about Chavez and what he achieved in the ring, and with even greater attachments, arduous times from boxing. Even Saul Canelo Alvarez will never replace Chavez in the hearts, souls and minds of Mexicans.

“I liked the appearance of Tommy Milligan from the first time I saw him – his some aggression, his boxing skills, his precise hit, and above all a workers’ way, as he defeated the opposition.”

These are the words of Gilbert’s strange, the previous one Boxing news An editor who joined the staff in 1922 and had the privilege of observing the development of boxing for most of the 20th century. Such support says a lot about the quality of the warrior, and Milligan can be easily overlooked today.

Circumscribed film material with a one -time British and European medium weight champion shows him brutally battered to overcome the great Mickey Walker In the unsuccessful auction of the world title in 1927. What constrained material does not show that Milligan boxed cleverly to win numerous early rounds and probably ran points until Walker turned the tables and eventually he did not finish it at 10.

Born at Shieldmuir in Lanarkshire, but put up for a settlement from Hamilton, Tommy became a professional at the age of 17 in 1921 and quickly gained a brand around the Scottish rings. His first massive win took place in December 1923, when at the age of 19 he detained the former British champion of lithe champion Seaman Hall in six rounds in Belfast. He followed this two months later another massive win when he defeated the future British letter in the average Alex Ireland on the Waverley market in Edinburgh. Then appeared a 15-round competition in the prestigious National Sports Club Covent Garden (NSC), compared to Bermondsey Ironman Joe Rolfe. When Milligan detained Joe in nine rounds, his supplies increased and in four months he faced the prevailing British and European welterweight titles TED Kid Lewis in the match for the championship.

The program has set a attendance record in Scotland, because 20,000 fans have put in Hall Industrial Hall in Edinburgh to see Tommy’s titles with the title of Ted with winning in 20-cars points. Three months later, Milligan added the European Medium weight belt to its silver software, developing Italian Bruno Frattini, despite the disadvantage of stone in a match organized by NSC in Holland Park. Then, in July 1926, Milligan captured the British 11-pound crown with a length of 14 indefinite round of George West in the same place.

Tommy did two successful defense of his titles against one man, Ted Moore of Plymouth, who two years earlier went to a distance with Harry Greb at World Honors at the Yankee stadium. Each time he stopped Ted in 14 rounds.

The winnings prompted Tommy to his unfortunate challenge of the world title against Walker, and although the Scot was probably not the same warrior after losing with Walker-he only had four fights and lost his British and European titles in Alex Ireland-she was one last night of glory, which stands out, at least on paper, at least as Milligan.

In June 1928, as part of the Royal Albert Hall, he faced ponderous lithe, the great Max Rosenbloom. Rosenbloom, called “Slapsa Max” because of his open style, was, however, an extraordinary boxer, about which the legendary coach Cus d’AMATO once said: “[He] He was probably the smartest warrior I’ve ever seen, defensively. You just couldn’t hit this man. “

Well, in the ninth round Milligan managed to hit Rosenbloom, leaving him with a winding agony on canvas when he was counted. The corner of the Americans accused the low blow, but the judge said that the blow was justified, which means that Tommy won the victory of KO.

Was the blow low? Without the material, you can’t say. But the BN reporter noticed that the doctor examined Max in his presence before “he strongly stated that there was no trace of any injury because of foulm.”

In any case, the result decreases as one of only two losses in an unusual record of 274, max (207-39-26), the fact that Milligan can be proud of.

Among the saddest experiences I had as a boxing historian, is the discovery of long forgotten competitions in which one of the heroes died at the hands of the opponent. Since the war, there have been many fatalities in the British rings, some with the participation of celebrated fighters, but fortunately they happen much less often than they used to be. In the first days of playing gloves, and then in the 1920s and 1930s, the game safety side was significantly omitted, and only one doctor usually participates in professional tournaments and medical for candidates, so today routine, unheard of. Judges often allowed boxers to be much more punished than today, and the general public, hardened both by the great war and a huge number of children dying at a youthful age, had a more bland approach to death in general. The boxer dying in the ring did not hit the headers in the way today. Recently, I came across the ancient Royal Marine postcard, a private sampson, whose name seemed particularly known to me. When I looked at him at my records, I saw that he had died in a competition at the cosmopolitan gymnasium in Plymouth in March 1914. I think it would be right to honor this unfortunate youthful man, saying what I know about his history.

William James Sampson was a member of the Royal Marine Lithe Infantry, and in the moment of his death he served on board HMS Majestic, a pre -anticipated battleship. RMLI produced many good professional boxers at that time and most of them often fought in “Cosmo”, because this celebrated ancient place was known by fans of the fight of this period. Sampson, from Taunton, had his first competition in February 1911 during service with the Navy. He was 26 at the time of his death. He had 14 professional competitions and each of them took place in Cosmo.

After losing the first three competitions that I can find for him, in December 1912 he led Dick Hillson from Plymouth. This was the first of a series of victories that would lead to his last two competitions, which were against one of the best men Plymouth at that time, youthful Lippo. In 1913, and the early part of 1914 Sampson was undefeated in eight competitions, and they saw how he passed from six runes to eight, then 10, and ultimately to 15-round at the summit of the bill.

On February 13, 1914, Sampson was adapted to Lippo in the first 15-rund. Sampson fought last week when he created a kind of surprise, knocking out the sailor Bob Savage in four rounds. He came as a very behind schedule substitute for Lippo, which was originally caused by the Frenchman, Auguste Dumas. Lippo was exceeding Sampson in class and few gave Marine a chance against him. The BN headline was: “Private Sampson creates a sensation” in the description of the fight against the game that Sampson established against Lippo. After the pair was exhausted in the ninth and forward in the points Sampson retired. Both were immediately adapted to a featherlight title in Western England, and three weeks later they met again. Sampson again fought with Lippo, raising him in the third, but he ran out of couple again. At 12. He suddenly fell on a canvas. He was transferred to his wardrobe, but he never regained consciousness. Private Sampson died the next afternoon. According to judge JT Hulls, Samppson led at the time of fall.

His ship, Majestic, lasted only a year longer, was torpedoed in Gallipoli with a loss of 49 accompanied by Sampson.