BROCKTON - Considering that a former champ can never hear “Eye of the Tiger” enough, Marvin Hagler had to smile as the crowd that gathered in Brockton City Hall’s sweltering lobby applauded loudly as the old boxing anthem was blasted from a pair of speakers.
After close to an hour of presentations, proclamations and attention-starved politicians set up against a backdrop of Civil War paintings, the song ended the affair with the abruptness of the thunderstorm that soon followed.
“Brockton’s my home,” the jet-lagged former middleweight champ said as he headed for an air-conditioned limousine. “I never get enough of this place.”
But this visit was clearly different. Hagler, who has sponsored two scholarship winners each year at Massasoit Community College, has put his name on a charity boxing tournament that will be held today starting at 5 p.m. at the Brockton Fairgrounds, with a “family fun festival” preceding the fight card, starting at 2 p.m.
Proceeds will benefit his favorite charity - the Hagler Scholarship Fund - as well as Brockton High School’s “Save Our Sports Program.”
The city also declared today Marvin Hagler Day. One might think there have been many such days bearing that title since Hagler’s retirement in 1987.
But beyond the Brockton Rox’ Hagler Bobblehead Doll Night two years ago during a baseball game, and despite Hagler’s occasional forays out of his postretirement home in Milan, Italy, the actual honor may not have been bestowed before today, according to event organizer Tony O’Brien.
“He likes to do things very low-key,” said O’Brien. But there was no escaping the love yesterday.
After starting his afternoon at MCC, where a plaque was unveiled to commemorate the scholarship fund, Hagler rode on to City Hall for a marathon meet-and-greet with old friends and seemingly every politician associated with the self-proclaimed City of Champions.
Still fit and befitting his home in one of the world’s style capitals, Hagler graciously walked through the crowd in a well-tailored light-gray suit, red tie and black shoes. As the ceremony droned on, Hagler alternately mopped the sweat off his legendary shaved head and pointed his finger at all of the familiar faces in the crowd.
Former sparring partners, brother Robbie Sims, old friends from the gym, former trainer Goody Petronelli - they all were there. The VIP list will expand tonight, when former opponents Thomas Hearns and Vito Antuofermo are expected to be on hand for the fight card. But Hagler shrugged at the mention of those names. “We all cross paths from time to time,” he said of the associations that come with his latest role as a boxing commentator.
This weekend is different. Though he was born in Newark, N.J., he considers Brockton the starting point. “I see a lot of differences coming back now, but it’s great to be here, seeing my family and friends and the people who followed my achievements,”Hagler said. “I just hope we can really put on a good show (tonight).”Judging from yesterday, he’ll have a receptive crowd. “Life has been very good to me,” he told the crowd. “Nothing is easy. It’s all hard, and when you’re trying to help, you have to focus on the youth.” Especially the youth of Brockton. Upon closing his brief speech with a flurry of Italian, Hagler pointed to the City Hall floor as he said, “A casa” - Italian for “at home.”
BROCKTON - The show, with a 7:30 p.m. bell for the first fight, was nearing deadline outside, but hometown hero Marvelous Marvin Hagler couldn’t escape the back room where all of the young amateur fighters were getting taped and doing some shadow boxing. “I love the young fighters,” said Hagler, the 52-year-old former middleweight champion.
Hagler’s Italian wife, Kate, wiped his shaved pate as the still-fit retired fighter attempted to stay cool in another of his Italian suits despite the sweltering conditions under the grandstand of the Brockton Fairgrounds.
“Just look at him,” said an admiring Robbie Sims, Hagler’s brother and a former fighter who continues to call Brockton home. “He’s like this. He knows we have a show to do, but he wants to stop and talk to everyone. These people love Marvin and what he’s done for this town.” As Sims noted, every time Hagler comes home from Milan, someone is always there to throw an honorary function. But prior to last night’s amateur boxing show, with proceeds benefiting Hagler’s scholarship fund at Massasoit Community College and the city’s Save Our Sports program, there had never been an official Marvin Hagler Night, at least not unless you count a bobblehead doll promotion run by the minor league baseball team, the Brockton Rox, two years ago.
Even Hagler seemed a little floored by that one. “It’s been a long time coming,” Hagler said with a laugh. “Yeah, I’m kind of surprised and amazed. But this is going to be a marvelous affair.”
Based on his slow walk through the back room, talking and slapping the backs of all those young amateur fighters - most of whom weren’t born when he retired in 1987 - the experience was already having a stirring effect on Hagler. “It’s great,” he said. “Looking at all of these kids here makes me very proud of what I’ve done. Hopefully they’ll follow my example.”
A few hints of the past were in the stands last night, in former Hagler opponent Vito Antuofermo and Emmanuel Steward, the legendary trainer of another Hagler opponent, Thomas Hearns. Though he was expected to fly in from Detroit, Hearns was a late scratch.
Hagler, through his work as a boxing analyst for England’s BBC network, has been in touch with most of these past associates and opponents. He also does kick-boxing commentary in Ireland. But he wants to reach back to his native country in a more relevant way. “I want to do things through film for boxers,” said the one-time action movie hero, though he’s not talking about a return to his Sgt. Indio character. “I want to show fighters that there is a life after boxing. If you do things right, you have a chance to land a good job after you’re finished and to be respectable in your community. “That’s what I’m all about, anyway. Hopefully we can see some of those good results in people. But this is great. Boxing can help these kids to find their way through life and to get some rewards. It can teach them to work through a block in their lives. And boxing can teach them from what I call the giddyup about how things work.”
One early student was in the stands last night. “I made my pro debut right around the time he fought Wilfred Scipion in the Providence Civic Center,” said former welterweight champion Vinny Pazienza. “I thought that if Marvin was going to lose, that wasn’t going to be a good omen for me. Look what happened.”
