Boxing

Bantamweight Brian Schrack, who has spent much of his youth chasing a major amateur boxing championship, punched his way into the finals of the Eastern Olympic trials last night with a victory over three-time national junior champion Frank Durst of Augusta, Ga. With a large, loud group of friends and relatives shouting encouragement at TropWorld Casino and Entertainment Resort, Schrack, 19, rallied after a slow start and scored a 6-3 win over...

Get Mike Tyson out of boxing. He soils the sport - a sport already tainted by a history of stain and suspicion. Boxing doesn't need Tyson. I mean, how many chances are we going to give this guy? He's been jailed for one rape and accused of others. He's bitten off part of the ear of one opponent; attempted, apparently, to break the leg of another, and sucker-punched yet another after the bell. Now, in his latest alpha-male, morally bankrupt life, Tyson verbally abused reporters after staging an absurdly violent confrontation with heavyweight champ Lennox Lewis in a prefight news conference for a $12 million bout, scheduled for April 6 (if Tyson can get a license, which I hope he can't)

The morning before Whitemarsh Police Officer Tyrone Tate was supposed to box in a Golden Gloves regional-championship fight, he was the first to arrive at the scene of an armed robbery. He was working the graveyard shift when the dispatch came in about 2:30 a.m. and he raced to the hotel in Fort Washington. Gun drawn and adrenaline pumping, he searched the hotel. The gunmen were gone, but behind a desk he found the night clerk tied up with wire. Hours later, Tate could finally let his guard down.

Joe Frazier, the son of a South Carolina sharecropper who punched meat in a Philadelphia slaughterhouse before Rocky, won Olympic gold, and beat an undefeated Muhammad Ali to become one of the all-time heavyweight greats, died on Monday, his family said in a statement. He was 67. Mr. Frazier, whose liver cancer was diagnosed about a month ago, spent his last days living under hospice care in a Center City apartment. Mr. Frazier, known as "Smokin' Joe," was small for a heavyweight, just under 6 feet tall, but compensated with a relentless attack in the ring, bobbing and weaving as if his upper body were on a tightly coiled spring, constantly moving forward, and throwing more punches than most heavyweights.

Richard J. Bennett, a middleweight scrapper who robbed opponents of wins while boxing under the name "Richie the Bandit," died Tuesday. He was 32 and lived in Darby, Delaware County. Bennett began boxing at age 14, and four years later he was fighting as a professional. Richie the Bandit snatched victory after victory by winning 31 of his 35 professional bouts, 18 of them by knockouts. "Richie got his nickname from a ring announcer whose mispronunciation of 'Richie J. Bennett' came over the loudspeaker more like 'Richie the Bandit,' " said his father, Richard Sr. "The name stuck with the kid. " The Bandit was the third-generation Bennett to lace up the gloves.

Willard Granville "Pete" Tucker, a former state employee and community volunteer, died Saturday. He was 75 and lived in Tioga-Nicetown. Tucker worked for the state Revenue Department as an inspector and at the Philadelphia Inquirer in the mail room. His real love was boxing. After returning from the Pacific theater, where he served with the Army during World War II, Tucker managed young fighters, some of whom turned professional. In 1986, he suffered paralyzing injuries from an auto accident, but stayed with boxing as a Golden Gloves coach.

BOUIE FISHER, one of Philadelphia's greatest boxing trainers, was dying. But he heard two men talking in his room in Virtua Hospital in Voorhees, N.J., one day last week and opened his eyes. There was his son James and a surprise visitor - Bernard "The Executioner" Hopkins, the man he had brought from the streets of North Philadelphia to a world championship. Bouie's eyes widened as Hopkins started shadowboxing, to show he still had the style his trainer had taught him. He backed up so Bouie could see his feet, the movement of which is as vital to a fighter's success as his fists.

Plans to convert the famed Blue Horizon on North Broad Street into a hotel with two restaurants are moving forward, its developers say. But a new notion - spurred by numerous inquiries the developers say they have received over the last month - also would have it housing a venue for boxing - the very thing the original Blue Horizon was known for. "We are considering it. It is known internationally as a boxing venue," said Scott Orens of Orens...

"Don't ask me about my career," says Francis X. "Pat" Duffy, who winces and laughs just thinking about his boxing career. "I had a few pro bouts (at 118 pounds) and found out it wasn't for me. " Sounds like the man took some lumps and quit the ring, but nothing could be further from the truth. "My entire life has been wrapped around boxing. I think boxing day and night. If I go to church, I'm thinking boxing," says Duffy, who looks like a cross between Edward G. Robinson and a leprechaun.

WILMINGTON - Butch Lewis promoted his first fight in the fourth grade, his sister Anita recalled. Lewis had convinced one of his friends to fight another kid in the school yard. It was in his DNA. Talented people gravitated to him. Then he made them stick. So it comes as no surprise that the little fourth grader became one of the greatest boxing promoters, having worked for more than 30 years with the likes of Joe Frazier, Muhammad Ali and Michael and Leon Spinks. At the celebration of Lewis' life on Monday afternoon, there was a parade of people who painted a picture of this unique man. More than 1,000 friends and family members attended the service after learning that Lewis died of natural causes on July 23 at the age of 65. They came to laugh at these stories.