Round One
The Heavyweight Championship
January 20, 2013
Madison Square Garden
Flashbulbs popped outside the boxing ring like the prelude to a violent thunderstorm, or, as Tommy Farrow dreaded, was the light show due instead to corneal starbursts behind his swollen eyelids? The handy-work of Johnson’s right jab followed up by his trademark left hook.
Like his idol Smokin’ Joe Frazier, what Joltin’ Jeffrey Johnson was known and most feared for was his devastating southpaw attack. And tonight, more so than any other night, it was landing with increasing frequency and pinpoint accuracy.
The fact that Farrow could no longer reliably discern between the two visual sensations was an ominous sign that no good could possibly come of this. His strength was slowly ebbing like the sands in an upturned hourglass. Sheer will, the guts and determination which were a by-product of his natural constitution and physical conditioning, was the only thing preventing him from floating out to sea with the flotsam and jetsam. But Farrow was well aware even in his semi-conscious state, that this was not an infinite resource. That, despite a second-round knockdown and building up an early lead on the judge’s scorecards his time was running out and his share of the heavyweight championship was doomed along with it, but that was all right.
Okay, I put on a good show; time to end this thing, he thought.
“A vicious left has Farrow’s knees wobbling,” said analyst Jim Lampley. “Backed into the corner, blood now streaking his right cheek. I don’t know how he is still standing.”
“Survival instinct,” said Larry Merchant. “Nothing more, nothing less. Oh, a right jab and another left and…I don’t believe what I’m seeing! Farrow has dropped his arms! Tommy Farrow is no longer defending himself! What on earth is he thinking?”
The volume produced by the thousands of fight-fans surrounding the small, roped boxing stage went from a deafening chant of Far-row! Far-row! Far-row! to a thunderous roar.
“Tommy seems distracted,” Lampley again. “He keeps looking into the stands.”
Flashbulbs continued to flicker ghostly and sizzle around the ring that now seemed to spin violently through the roaring mob.
“That’s gotta hurt! Another Johnson combination and Farrow has still not raised his arms. What could possibly be going through his mind?” said Merchant.
“Farrow, now thirty-six years old, is not the same man who started this fight. Something must have snapped…ow! A big left by Johnson!” said Lampley, the volume of his voice increasing with excitement. “A right jab…another left and Farrow is still looking out ringside.”
Due to the measure of noise in Madison Square Garden it seemed the roof would likely blow off and up into the vast expanse of night sky like a soda bottle top fueled by the violent, shaken fury of carbonated air.
“A hard right followed by a punishing left hook! The round steam-training to a close, just under twenty seconds to go!” Larry Merchant yelling into his microphone now, trying to edge his voice above the havoc in the arena.
“A quick right jab to the face, another left, an assault to the body!”
Merchant was talking without breathing, calling the attack as it played out before him. The sickening sound of Johnson’s leather gloves pounding into Farrow’s flesh was not unlike Keith Moon destroying his drum kit in a ferocious blurred rage.
“The left hook again perfectly executed and Farrow finally hits the deck! My God, what has happened here tonight?”
The commentator’s voice, now very small, was lost somewhere in a sea of cheers and yells, a tidal wave of shrieks and frenzied screams. The referee sends Johnson to a neutral corner and begins a count that Tommy Farrow looks to have no chance of beating.
One…Two…
“Tickets! Tickets! Who needs two for the big fight tonight?”
The scalpers were working Seventh Avenue earlier in the evening, their breath misting before them on the cold January air as they sought suckers or out-of-towners to part with double or triple the face value on tonight’s main event at the Garden. A unification bout between the two reigning divisional heavyweight champions whose menacing profiles and career records were on vivid display on the giant screen outside the arena.
TOMMY "HEATSEEKER" FARROW
37-0 (32 KO) WBO HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION
JOLTIN’ JEFFREY JOHNSON
32-0 (29 KO) IBF HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION
THERE CAN ONLY BE ONE KING IN THS TOWN…
AND KONG IS DEAD!
“Sold out, baby,” said one of the scalpers to two guys from Long Island hoping to score a couple of cheap nosebleed seats just to be there.
“I got your only way inside right here.”
He waved a handful of tickets, the legitimacy of which was dubious at best.
Highlights of both Farrow and Johnson’s previous fights played on the video monitor overlooking the pandemonium in front of Penn Station, where the excitable fight crowd was tame in comparison to the tourists and club-hoppers impatiently vying for cabs to whatever Saturday night destination they couldn’t seem to get to soon enough. Shopping, drinking, dancing, fucking?
Only the Vegas odds-makers, promoters, and Pay-Per-View providers whose personal gains from this event were believed to rival that of the contestants themselves, outdid the level of anticipation for this long-awaited match-up among the boxing faithful. Much was to be gained, or lost according to what side of the action you happened to be on this night and everyone wanted to be as close to it as humanly possible. To feel the electricity, see the blood, smell the sweat, hear the sadistic pounding of leather against flesh, perhaps touch the robed gladiators as they made their memorable entrances into the 20x20 foot slaughterhouse. Sensory overload.
No two people, however, experienced the gravity of the situation on a more visceral level than Tommy Farrow and Jeffrey Johnson: the pre-dawn roadwork, running the streets of Farrow’s freezing Boston and Johnson’s sweltering Atlanta respectively, which began while the nine-to-fivers were still snug in their beds, hitting the snooze alarm for the first of many times. The seemingly interminable weight training and sparring sessions in stinking, too-hot or too-cold gyms, black eyes, broken noses, bruised ribs, plus the pissing of blood and the dozens of amateur bouts, tournaments and competitions. Both were Golden Gloves champions, Farrow in New England after having lost in the previous years’ finals, Johnson a two-time title-holder in the Mid-South region.
Never had the two squared off against one another, as amateurs or professionals, before tonight. As both rose steadily through the heavyweight rankings at roughly the same time, much intrigue and speculation did abound, but it was thought best by the powers-that-be to wait for the right time and more importantly, a huge payday.
Nearly seventy wins between the two. Not a single loss, or draw, each with shares of the world heavyweight title. It was beyond obvious that the time was now.
Three…
Linda Farrow, formerly Canzoneri, was born and raised in Boston’s Italian North End, her husband James an Irish Southie transplant from County Cork and reformed street-tough. Both tall and attractive, it came as little surprise to family and friends that their first-and only-born, Thomas, quickly grew into his eventual six-foot-two frame, supplemented by muscle, natural and hard earned by way of dock-work down at the harbor from the age of fourteen.
Struggling to retain some semblance of consciousness, Tommy even now knew that relinquishing his title tonight was a foregone conclusion and the grasp on his very life was becoming more tenuous with every passing, precious second, but that was okay.
His thoughts turned toward his mother and father at home in North Reading some forty miles north of Boston. They did not disapprove of their little boy’s profession, indeed they were proud of his accomplishments as any parent of any child could possibly be. And James could hardly protest after the shenanigans that earned him multiple stretches in juvenile hall and a very long weekend at the Suffolk County Riverhead Jail in his twenties when he would spend summers with his family on Long Island. They, however, could not, and never did attend one of Tommy’s fights. Tonight’s bout was an example of why.
He reflected on holidays together, opening what felt like a never-ending pile of presents amidst mugs of steaming hot chocolate and shredded, multi-colored wrapping paper. A family vacation to the Grand Canyon where his father’s reluctance to stop and ask directions resulted in the Farrows becoming hopelessly lost and James exclaiming:
“We’ll know when we get there now, won’t we? It’s a giant fucking hole in the ground. If nothing else, we’ll drive straight into it.”
The remark relieved the tension that had been building in the car all morning into the afternoon and the three of them burst out laughing, pulling over for lunch and gas and yes, proper directions.
Tommy would have laughed now had he the motor skills and respiratory function necessary to do so. The crazy shit you think of at times like this.
Four…