What does a mainstream, daily newspaper do when it has been covering sports in a city with major boxing scenes, both amateur and professional, without touching those scenes n or even betraying knowledge of their existence n but then suddenly gets alerted to their explosive vitality by the relentless local boxing coverage of a crosstown minority paper?
Watch the Post-Dispatch, and see for yourself.
The Post sent one of its gaggle of sportswriters, Tom Wheatley, to the Golden Gloves last weekend. All and good. Important event, should be covered; Tom is a pro. The problem is, Wheatley and his assistant (yes, the bigs apparently get assistants) didn’t seem to know what or most importantly who they were watching. You would have thought the fight card was written in Greek rather than filled with the names of local fighters who appear weekly in our Fighting Words column.
Lucky for Tom. A famous name steps into the ring. A Spinks! Leon Spinks Jr. (a name that is something of a stretch, but that’s a different story).
“I’m gonna interview this kid,” Wheatley said, and he was off to grill a very undistinguished young fighter who happens to have an illustrious name.
The man from the Post had to step over a hundred hard-working, talented, more promising fighters to get to the kid. But, hey, what did he know? He had just parachuted in for that fight and would soon be gone.
Word to the bigs: learn this scene, or stay home. You look silly out there.