Matthew Saad Muhammad

Former light-heavyweight champion Matthew Saad Muhammad headlines this year's class of inductees into the Pennsylvania Boxing Hall of Fame. The ceremony and fund-raising dinner will be tomorrow at 5 p.m. at Romano's Caterers at Castor and Wingohocking Streets. Tickets are $40. Funds raised will go toward a permanent home for the local boxing Hall of Fame and museum under construction in Port Richmond. Muhammad, 51, was a Philadelphia great who held titles from 1977 to 1984.

Nicholas Belfiore Sr., 85, a boxing trainer who once worked with champions Matthew Saad Muhammad and Jeff Chandler, and who was the former owner of the Juniper Gym in South Philadelphia, died Tuesday at Underwood-Memorial Hospital in Woodbury, N.J. He was a former longtime resident of South Philadelphia and had been a resident of the Fountains, a retirement community in Pennsauken, N.J. Mr. Belfiore founded the Juniper Gym at 1300 S. Juniper...

Maybe you only get one miracle per lifetime. Matthew Saad Muhammad seems all right with that. He made the most of his, going from toddler abandoned on the streets of Philadelphia to light-heavyweight champion of the world. And besides, Saad Muhammad doesn't really need a miracle now. At 56, he just needs one chance to get back on his feet. The boy found on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in 1958 is a man who found himself back on the street again, without a job or a home. It was the hardest thing Saad Muhammad has had to do, harder than the hours of training and the epic fights that left him and his opponent bloodied, battered and exhausted.

The telephone call received by Philadelphia boxing legend Matthew Saad Muhammad, the one informing him of his election to the International Boxing Hall of Fame, was almost as big a shock to the former light-heavyweight champion as the outcome of some of his bouts. "I didn't even know I was on the ballot until I got the call from [Hall of Fame executive director] Ed Brophy," Saad Muhammad, 42, said yesterday from his home in Pleasantville, N.J. "I really didn't know what to say. I was very surprised and very thankful.

When you are 36 - and the twilight of your career is threatening to turn pitch dark at any moment - a postponed fight can be murder. Matthew Saad Muhammad is 36, and he has faced four postponements since November. Each delay has brought a fresh round of disappointment, but the fight he has been awaiting is finally on again - this time, it seems, for good. Saad Muhammad, the former light-heavyweight champion from Philadelphia, will meet a man 13 years his junior, Ed Mack, in a scheduled eight-round bout on Tuesday at the National Guard Armory in North Philadelphia.

Matthew Saad Muhammad is too sweet for his profession, and one of these days he will retire and will not have to suffer the contradiction anymore. But that day has not arrived, not yet. Fighting for the first time in more than a year, the aging former champion lost a unanimous decision to Ed "The Attack" Mack in an eight-round light- heavyweight bout last night at the National Guard Armory in Northeast Philadelphia - a loss that failed to discourage him from his lonely quest to regain the title he lost almost 10 years ago. Mack, 21, of Philadelphia, raised his record to 11-1-1; Saad Muhammad, 36, of Pleasantville, N.J., dropped to 38-12-3.

HE STANDS OUTSIDE the Ridge Center, the largest homeless shelter in Philadelphia, and Matthew Saad Muhammad talks about what it is like inside, about how some of the residents recognize him, about the incessant greeting he hears: "How you doing, champ? How you doing, champ?" "I just kind of put my head down sometimes," he said. "It's almost like I don't want people to see me. There are times when I can't believe I'm here. " For about 2 months, the Ridge Center has been Saad Muhammad's home.

When Meldrick Taylor and Glenwood "The Real Beast" Brown step into the ring tonight at the Civic Center, almost 10 years - and countless club fights - will have passed since the last world title bout was held here. Taylor, appearing in a championship fight in his home town for the first time, will defend the World Boxing Association version of the welterweight crown. Taylor was 15, two years from winning an Olympic gold medal, when Dwight Muhammad Qawi and Matthew Saad Muhammad staged the last championship fight here, on Aug. 8, 1982, at the Spectrum.

John Santos Sr., an avid boxing fan who traveled on the fight circuit with his adopted son, former light-heavyweight champion Matthew Saad Muhammad, died Sunday. He was 85 and lived in South Philadelphia. Santos and his wife, Bertha, adopted Muhammad when he was 7 and known as Matthew Franklin. Santos traveled with Muhammad to Atlantic City, San Diego, Las Vegas and other cities to watch him defend his World Boxing Association title. Muhammad lost the title to Dwight Braxton in 1981.

Matthew Saad Muhammad, former World Boxing Association light-heavyweight champion, announced yesterday that he was ending his three-year retirement and would attempt a comeback at age 30. Muhammad, light-heavyweight champ from April 1979 through December 1981, has a professional record of 34-5 with 24 knockouts. He lost his title to Dwight Braxton in December 1981. Muhammad, a Philadelphian, will fight journeyman Chris Wells of Orlando, Fla., Friday night at the Diplomat Hotel in Hallandale, Fla., just north of Miami Beach.

THIS ISN'T THE best of times for homeowners. My roof is leaking and needs to be replaced, my annual property taxes are more than $10,000, and the value of my residence plunged when the housing market crashed. But whenever I am inclined to feel sorry for myself, I remember that there are those who are spending their nights sleeping on grates or in large cardboard boxes beneath highway overpasses. For many homeless persons, necessity dictates that all their worldly possessions must fit into a shopping cart or a plastic garbage bag. Don't spend much time thinking about the plight of the less fortunate?

HE STANDS OUTSIDE the Ridge Center, the largest homeless shelter in Philadelphia, and Matthew Saad Muhammad talks about what it is like inside, about how some of the residents recognize him, about the incessant greeting he hears: "How you doing, champ? How you doing, champ?" "I just kind of put my head down sometimes," he said. "It's almost like I don't want people to see me. There are times when I can't believe I'm here. " For about 2 months, the Ridge Center has been Saad Muhammad's home.

Maybe you only get one miracle per lifetime. Matthew Saad Muhammad seems all right with that. He made the most of his, going from toddler abandoned on the streets of Philadelphia to light-heavyweight champion of the world. And besides, Saad Muhammad doesn't really need a miracle now. At 56, he just needs one chance to get back on his feet. The boy found on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in 1958 is a man who found himself back on the street again, without a job or a home. It was the hardest thing Saad Muhammad has had to do, harder than the hours of training and the epic fights that left him and his opponent bloodied, battered and exhausted.

Former light-heavyweight champion Matthew Saad Muhammad headlines this year's class of inductees into the Pennsylvania Boxing Hall of Fame. The ceremony and fund-raising dinner will be tomorrow at 5 p.m. at Romano's Caterers at Castor and Wingohocking Streets. Tickets are $40. Funds raised will go toward a permanent home for the local boxing Hall of Fame and museum under construction in Port Richmond. Muhammad, 51, was a Philadelphia great who held titles from 1977 to 1984.

Before there was Rocky Balboa, there was Matthew Saad Muhammad. In the fictional character and the real-life boxer, there was a reservoir of heart rarely found in men. There was a presence that compelled their audiences to love them, to cringe when they felt pain, and to feel triumphant in their victories. Why shouldn't fans feel the same way about these men? Saad Muhammad would suggest that he is Rocky. In his modest Manayunk rowhouse, the still-handsome Saad Muhammad fished through his treasure of old photographs, videotapes, and other remnants of the bountiful career that took him to glorious heights and regretful depths, and he searched for the evidence.

Maybe it's because they'll be inducted together into the International Boxing Hall of Fame here Sunday afternoon, but Lou Duva can't stop tossing verbal bouquets toward Matthew Saad Muhammad. "Saad Muhammad was an outstanding fighter," Duva, the legendary manager and trainer, said of the former World Boxing Council light-heavyweight champion. "He's the one guy who I think, if he were around today, could beat Roy Jones Jr. His style would just wear you down. It wore down a lot of good fighters, and I think it would wear Jones down.

The telephone call received by Philadelphia boxing legend Matthew Saad Muhammad, the one informing him of his election to the International Boxing Hall of Fame, was almost as big a shock to the former light-heavyweight champion as the outcome of some of his bouts. "I didn't even know I was on the ballot until I got the call from [Hall of Fame executive director] Ed Brophy," Saad Muhammad, 42, said yesterday from his home in Pleasantville, N.J. "I really didn't know what to say. I was very surprised and very thankful.

They come expecting to see a war, and Arturo Gatti never disappoints. The International Boxing Federation junior lightweight champion always delivers more action than can be found in a Jean-Claude Van Damme movie. "If you want to see a great fight and Arturo Gatti's on, you have to show up," Gatti said after he defended his title Saturday night with a 12-round, unanimous decision over the man he beat for the title 14 months earlier, Tracy Harris Patterson (57-5-1, 39 KOs). Gatti (27-1, 22 KOs)

Nicholas Belfiore Sr., 85, a boxing trainer who once worked with champions Matthew Saad Muhammad and Jeff Chandler, and who was the former owner of the Juniper Gym in South Philadelphia, died Tuesday at Underwood-Memorial Hospital in Woodbury, N.J. He was a former longtime resident of South Philadelphia and had been a resident of the Fountains, a retirement community in Pennsauken, N.J. Mr. Belfiore founded the Juniper Gym at 1300 S. Juniper...

"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.