The Fight to Bring White Collar Boxing Back to NY Continues The Glassjaw Chronicles by Thomas Gerbasi (Aug 19, 2008) Send this page to friend Give us your feedback The morning after was rough. It usually is when you’re 40 years old and out of shape, and you decide that it’s a good idea to run around the basketball courts in Coney Island for a couple of hours on a beautiful Saturday afternoon with a bunch of people half your age. But you know what the great thing about it was? When I stepped on the court – of my free will of course – I didn’t have to get a full physical, I didn’t have to sign away my first born, and I didn’t have a sanctioning body looking over my shoulder. The next morning, my bumps and bruises were my own, nothing an Advil couldn’t cure, and I went about my business. Remember, this is the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave. Yet here in New York State, White Collar Boxing – an opportunity for those not pursuing professional or serious amateur competition to go a few rounds in a controlled environment – isn’t allowed. Since November of 2005, people are allowed to go across the middle of a field in a tackle football game, go up for a rebound in between two 6-5, 250 pounders, bungee jump, skydive, or any number of things that can hurt you, but they can’t put on headgear and gloves and compete for nothing but pride in a White Collar Boxing event. Hard to believe, eh? Well, maybe it’s not. Maybe in a day and age where Little League baseball players hit off a tee and wear more protective gear than a high school middle linebacker, and where skinning a knee is not only frowned upon but a cause for a trip to the emergency room, this is commonplace. Maybe government intervention is the answer to everything these days, but I don’t agree, and luckily, there are those out there fighting for something that in the great scheme of things really doesn’t mean a lot except to those doing it. One of those leading the fight is someone who you probably wouldn’t point to and say ‘there’s a boxer,’ but since he first entered a boxing gym in 1992, John Oden has led the charge to let the world know what the sport has done for him. A principal in money management sales at AllianceBernstein, Oden is someone who could quietly do his thing on the side and not get involved in this fight, but instead, he has jumped in with both fists to give back to a sport to which he admittedly owes a lot. “I love the sport and I do need to do the sport,” said Oden, who authored the 2005 book ‘White Collar Boxing: One Man’s Journey from the Office to the Ring’. “It’s really been great for me in terms of my physical conditioning, my state of mind, the way I feel, the way I look, and the way I am. And I don’t mind sharing that with people if it helps the sport achieve the place it should in the scheme of things. Maybe I’m giving back because it’s been so good to me.” That’s what boxing can do for you. Despite all the negatives associated with the sport when it comes to corrupt business practices, long-term health effects on pro boxers, and horrid officiating, at its core, the sport is one of the purest there is. It’s one on one competition with no extraneous garbage going on once the bell rings. It may be even purer on the white collar level, where those who have trained in the sport get to test what they’ve learned in a setting where they find out more about themselves then they would in a cardio boxing or Tae Bo class. In New York, the “czar”, so to speak, of White Collar Boxing is undoubtedly the owner of Gleason’s Gym, Bruce Silverglade, who had been putting on shows in the revered Brooklyn boxing landmark for 17 years until the ban came down in 2005. On the average of once a month, Silverglade would put on White Collar cards pitting his own gym members against each other or against budding boxers from other gyms. In 1997, one of those outsiders, yours truly, took the trip to the city where I was born and raised to compete in a show a week before I fought in the New York Golden Gloves. With my father in tow (I didn’t want my wife or sister-in-law to go in case I didn’t react too well to getting hit in a real fight), I paid my $20 entry fee and was matched up with a guy who looked to me to be your ‘typical’ white collar boxer – well-groomed yuppie with a wife who can probably recite the Starbucks menu with the precision of a master surgeon. Little did I know when the bell rang that I was matched with the white Larry Holmes, as his jab zeroed in on my head with painful accuracy. Luckily, you brought your own headgear, so I had the industrial strength model with a bar across the face, making me look more like Tom Brady than Tommy Hearns. 30 seconds in, my gas tank was empty, and the unique doubt that can only take place in boxing roared into my head. Do I quit? Do I take a knee? Do I yell for my father to come in and help me? Or do I just put up my hands and take my beating for the remaining minute and 30 seconds. I chose the latter, and as I made it back to my corner, I looked for a stool to sit on – there was none. I opened my mouth for water, and my trainer didn’t even give me enough to get the power of speech back. He grabbed my head, turned it towards the opposite corner, and said ‘Look at him, he’s just as tired as you are.’ “Not likely,” I croaked back with my last ounce of energy. But I went back out there, and as the rounds progressed, I fought through the fatigue, and in the final round, my buddy Holmes actually did get tired and I saw everything coming in slow motion. I was able to pick off shots and actually score a bit. When it was over, I felt good, I felt accomplished, I felt like a fighter. And it was like Little League – there were no winners or losers and everybody got a trophy. As I sat in the locker room afterwards, getting dressed, I got a number of handshakes from the trainers and the other combatants on the card. It was nice, sorta like going back to the days when you were a kid and played high school sports and had that glowing kind of tired where your body was beat up but you felt you could stay up for days. I know I’m not the only one who felt like that after a White Collar Boxing match, and it’s what makes the sport so addictive. Silverglade knows this, and so he began the shows in Gleason’s. And not only is it good for the people who train at the gym, it’s good for business. “It helps my gym,” said Silverglade. “I have quite a few businessmen and businesswomen who train here and boxing is an addictive type of sport. It’s like ‘what’s next, what can I do?’ The logical conclusion in boxing is that you have competition, and with competition, people will continue to stay in my gym and continue to pay me my monthly dues. When they get frustrated and say, ‘well, this is great, but what else am I gonna do?’ then they’ll go look for another sport. So the shows help retain customers in my gym and then the amount we make helps me with my rent.” Rent in Brooklyn’s DUMBO section isn’t cheap, and every little bit helps, even if the estimated $1500 to $2000 Silverglade brings in for the shows won’t make him rich anytime soon. And the money he makes mainly comes from the $15 spectator fees, not from the $20 the participants put in, which basically pays for your post-fight trophy. “The trophies cost me $18, I charged $20, and you paid for your own trophy,” he laughs. For 17 years, the shows went off pretty much without a hitch. While not sanctioned, they were events that no one really went out of their way to crack down on, even though there were always whispers that someone may show up to shut the event down. Other New York gyms, such as Church Street Boxing and the Trinity Boxing Club, joined in the act. “The commission was aware of them and looked the other way,” said Silverglade. “They were contained in the gyms, only gym members were doing it. It was helping to support the local gyms, so there was no major problem.” But in late 2005, a charity event in Long Island which featured White Collar Boxing was ‘outed’ by someone Silverglade calls a “disgruntled individual” who informed the New York State Athletic Commission that the show was unsanctioned by state law. Then-commissioner Ron Scott Stevens was called in, and he pulled the plug on the show. “He (Stevens) subsequently told me that if they close it once, they have to close it everywhere, so I could no longer do the shows,” recalled Silverglade, who admits that he was initially distraught by the news that there would be no more White Collar Boxing shows. That’s when he and Oden put their heads together to come up with a solution that works for everyone involved. “Initially it was upsetting, and I was, quite frankly, mad,” said Oden when informed of the NYSAC’s call on White Collar Boxing. “But as I thought about it, I thought that if you could really get this setup in a way that everyone benefits by just having more people oversee it, there are benefits to this occurring. I personally view White Collar Boxing as just exercise. And having the competition just heightens the interest and excitement. There’s nothing like being in the ring. It takes it to another level, and when that happens I get in even better shape, which is why I did it to begin with.” And along with being a spokesman for the benefits of the sport, Oden is helping Silverglade get an amendment to New York’s law governing boxing in the state. Currently, professional boxing is regulated by the NYSAC. Amateur boxing is allowed under three exceptions: if under the auspices of USA Boxing, the military, or the school system. Silverglade wants White Collar Boxing to be run under the supervision of a new sanctioning body which he will run, the United States White Collar Boxing Federation. Using the same rules, regulations, and medical requirements as USA Boxing, Silverglade and Oden’s federation has had a bill make it through the Senate, but the Assembly has been a tougher nut to crack. Oden is hopeful of a positive outcome though. “The more people we tell our story to, the more it resonates,” he said. “I personally feel it’s going to have a good ending, and in the meantime, all people have to do is pick up newspapers and see what’s going on in London, Hong Kong, Dallas, and Chicago, and know that this sport is for real, and it’s a great thing. By having this new governing body officially established, so many more people can participate in it. New York is the home of White Collar Boxing and it’s the only place in the world where you can’t do it.” But what will happen to the sport if it does get reinstated in New York? Will bureaucratic red tape and increased requirements – both physically and financially – kill it off for many participants? “There will be additional medical requirements,” said Silverglade. “There will be a doctor present for each bout, and each competitor will take a physical from the doctor that’s present the night of the show. Rules and regulations, instead of being verbal, will be formalized and written, and people will actually have to join the organization and conform to the rules.” Doesn’t sound too bad, even for a cynic like me. And Silverglade isn’t bothered in the least by the change to the sport. “Initially I was distraught, wondering how my gym was going to survive, but in reality, what it’s doing is formalizing and legitimatizing White Collar Boxing so that when it’s reinstated, we’ll have bigger and better shows,” he said. “Instead of just having a show at my gym and not being able to really advertise it very much, I’ll be able to challenge the Church Street Gym and say ‘okay, Gleason’s versus Church Street’ and we can get publicity on it and make them bigger and better events. And if someone like Women’s Breast Cancer comes by and wants to have a benefit, they can rent out a big hotel and promote a show based on White Collar Boxing, and nobody has to hide or look over their shoulder, hoping that nobody comes by and tells them that it can’t be done. So in reality, it’s forcing the issue, which will be much better in the long run.” When it’s back, there will be even more people who can get that feeling that only boxing can bring. That’s not to say there won’t be detractors who think that no one should box, especially businessmen and businesswomen, but don’t tell that to John Oden. “There are risks in the sport, and there are people who have various opinions of boxing,” said ‘The Pecos Kid’. “Not everybody understands boxing, and I personally think it’s the most misunderstood of sports. If more people knew about what a great workout it is and how terrific the sport can be, I think it would be much more accepted. I don’t know how many people I’ve converted, but I’ve converted a few.” If you want to see White Collar Boxing back in New York, email NY Assemblyman Steve Englebright at engles@ assembly.state.ny.us and reference bill A5227. Now available, Thomas Gerbasi’s latest boxing compilation: Fightin’ to Writin’ – More Ring Ramblings. For more information, click here http://www.amazon.com/Fightin-Writin-More-Ring-Ramblings/dp/0595486665/ref=sr_1_12?ie=UTF 8&s=books&qid=1202272469&sr=8-12 Discuss this Topic - Go to the forums E-Mail Thomas Gerbasi at tgerbasi@mindspring.com or visit www.myspace.com/gerbasi