In an amazing life journey that spanned 90 years, Angelo Dundee (1921-2012) traveled from the mean streets of South Philly to the dusky catacombs of New York’s fabled Stillman’s Gym to the camps of ring immortals ranging from Carmine Basilio to Muhammad Ali to George Foreman to Sugar Ray Leonard. As a trainer, Dundee worked the corners; and as a person, he knew all the angles.
Though Dundee never put on the gloves as a pro, he nevertheless loomed large over a storied half-century of boxing history. During that era he trained a record-setting fifteen world champions and countless top contenders–wiping away their sweat and blood and instilling whatever it took to win. In that period, he even found time to coach Russell Crowe to a credible performance as “Gentleman” Jim Braddock in the movie, Cinderella Man, while in countless other ways making an indelible mark on the “sweet science,” in and out of the ring.
Active practically to the end–he served as “strategy consultant” to Oscar de la Hoya in his 2008 bout with Manny Pacquiao–Dundee hardened men’s bodies and conditioned their minds. He avoided the temptation to tamper with genius by handling Cassius Clay [later Muhammad Ali] “with kid gloves…,” as he recalled in his 2007 memoir, The View from My Corner, letting the brash young pugilist think he was in charge, even as Dundee molded him to be “The Greatest.” But when he had to push a fighter’s buttons, he could do that, too, as he had with Ray Leonard, who was behind on points late in his epic 1981 bout with Thomas “Hitman” Hearns: ”You’re blowing it son, you’re blowing it.”
Dundee was often quoted as saying, “I’m not star-quality; the fighter is the star.” But it’s clear that there will never be another like him in the fight game.
