LAS VEGAS — As I stood inside MGM's Grand Garden Arena for a celebration of the venue's 100th boxing card, I couldn't help but think about Oct. 2, 1980, the first time I remember attending a major fight card in Las Vegas.
My grandfather had secured ringside seats for "The Last Hurrah!"
Muhammad Ali's effort against Larry Holmes was a far cry from any hurrah, but it certainly brought tears to my eyes. Watching Ali get pummeled into retirement wasn't what I expected at 11 years old.
Here I thought Holmes was a nice guy for signing my autograph book before he ever even won a championship belt — he signed it "the future champ, Larry Holmes" — and I just watched him bring an end to "The Greatest."
I also didn't know it would be one of many fight nights I'd enjoy in Las Vegas, including what was supposed to be Holmes' swan song nearly 15 years later (April 8, 1995), when he was tattered by Oliver McCall for the WBC World Heavyweight belt.
Sporting Tribune writer and columnist W.G. Ramirez stands in front of the commemorative banner that was raised to the rafters at the MGM Grand Garden for its 100th boxing card. PHOTO COURTESY: W.G. Ramirez
Holmes fought nine more times before retiring with a 69-6-0 mark. I'd watch three of them, including two as a member of the media, as I also saw him lose a unanimous decision to Evander Holyfield on June 19, 1992.
All three I'd see at Caesars Palace.
As the glitz of Las Vegas Boulevard became embroidered into the fabric of boxing, "Fight Night" in this town has always been more than a professional boxing bout between two athletes trained to destroy the other.
It was an event, and still is.
'Boxing ... synonymous with Las Vegas'
"Boxing has been synonymous with Las Vegas for the past 40 or 50 years, and the 'Entertainment Capital of the World' became the 'Boxing Capital of the World'," legendary commentator Jim Gray told The Sporting Tribune during the celebration. "A lot of great events that have taken place here.
"And memorable not only for boxing fans, but for casual fans because they become historic. Ali, what happened out at Caesars Palace in the parking lot. (Marvin) Hagler and (Thomas) Hearns, one of the greatest fights ever. And (José Luis) Corollas and (Diego) Castillo at Mandalay Bay was maybe the greatest fight ever. … Mike Tyson and an ear-biting - there's a lot to unpack."
There really is.
Imagine one of many full-circle moments as a journalist when I covered Ali's grandson, Nico Ali Walsh, in his MGM Grand Garden debut on April 30, 2022, on the undercard of Shakur Stevenson's unanimous decision win over Oscar Valdez for the WBC and WBO Super Featherweight crowns.
"Everyone's got a story of my grandfather, but every story is different," Ali Walsh said Thursday at the celebratory event. "And especially when I hear someone like you who's in my hometown, you've lived here basically your whole life. I've been here my whole life.
"You're seeing different generations. And I think that's awesome."
Extremely awesome, but let's go back.
Before I was even credentialed as a member of the media, "Fight Night" meant buying a new outfit because even if you weren't attending the match, you were hitting the nightclubs afterward. And we're not talking about the maniacal, zany type of hotel clubs we see now, the ones with overpriced bottles of liquor served by scantily clad women who make more for walking the bottle to your table than the bottle itself costs at a local store.
There was Botany's, Tramps, Premier, Chaz, Shark, Play It Again Sam's — all in the 80's, and they were the place to be.
Sporting Tribune writer and columnist W.G. Ramirez during a radio interview with legendary Hall of Fame boxer Sugar Ray Leonard in the early 1990s. PHOTO: Courtesy of W.G. Ramirez
And before the DJs pulled the wax from their album sleeves and put together mega-mixes for packed dance floors, me and my boy would head to Caesars Palace and stroll through the casino to see different celebrities from every walk of life — singers, actors and actresses, athletes — all there to see a fight.
We didn't have tickets mind you, but that was the hot spot early in the evening. After grabbing a drink, we'd head to the outdoor stadium, situated in Caesars' parking lot, and every time we'd see someone we knew, it'd be a dap-and-a-hug, and of course, we'd lie and tell them we were headed into the stadium shortly but if we didn't see them inside we'd catch up with them at the club later.
It was always at one of the clubs, later.
Many a night we shared cocktails with former boxer Iran Barkley at Play It Again Sam's, which was a jazz bar before it turned into a gentlemen's club.
Different point of view
By the time I officially covered my first boxing match, the 1984, 1988 and 1992 U.S. Olympic Boxing teams had produced fighters such as Meldrick Taylor, Pernell Whitaker, Mark Breland, Holyfield, Michael Carbajal, Kennedy McKinney, Roy Jones Jr., Ray Mercer, Riddick Bowe and Oscar De La Hoya.
I couldn't wait to enter a different spectrum when it came to boxing.
The build-up with an initial press conference weeks or months before to promote the match and then the final pre-fight presser with an elegant luncheon two days before the weigh-in.
The night of the event was a page out of old-school Vegas when people went to showrooms to see headliners and wore their best suits and dresses. Nights out meant something, not just a casual couple of hours in shorts and a designer tee.
From Caesars' famed Sports Pavilion, to its outdoor stadium, to Boxing at the Boat (Showboat), to the Hilton Convention Center, to the Imperial Palace, to the Silver Slipper, to the Mirage, and to the Thomas and Mack Center when it entered the realm to host boxing, to now, the eventual current places we're seeing boxing events take place, like Mandalay Bay, T-Mobile Arena and the MGM Grand Garden.
As mentioned, Gray and I chopped it up briefly to talk about the 100 boxing cards at MGM's venue and for many of boxing's young stars, that's all they know.
As much as it meant for Holmes and Ali and the fighters of their era to fight at Caesars Palace, fighting for a belt in Las Vegas means plenty to today's pugilists if they're doing so inside the MGM Grand Garden.
"I'm grateful to be a part of this moment," Gervonta "Tank" Davis said Saturday night shortly after his demolition, an eight-round KO of Frank Martin. "At first, when I used to fight in Vegas when I was an amateur, you used to get tired and stuff because of the altitude. And now, (as a) professional things start to come together.
"So, just being a part of this whole thing, fighting in Vegas, fighting at the MGM, I'm grateful to be here and be under the same building as a lot of legends."
Tank is easily the pound-for-pound best fighter in the world and I've been saying that since I watched him devastate Ryan Garcia 14 months ago.
But as I watched this young man handle his post-fight press conference among a throng of media members in a packed ballroom, I couldn't help but recollect Nov. 5, 1994.
Actually, I had been thinking about that date all week, leading up to Davis-Martin, knowing it would be the 100th fight card. But I also remembered being inside the Garden for the ninth-ever card, entitled "One For The Ages," when George Foreman was losing on every judge's card, but proceeded to knockout Michael Moorer in the 10th round.
As media members, you don't cheer, boo, hiss — anything. You simply tend to your notes and start filing on deadline when someone delivers a knockout punch with thousands of people screaming around you.
That night, I distinctly remember media members with tears in their eyes, hugging one another because of what they just witnessed. It was quite a scene.
"Fight Night," in Vegas, is what it was.
Lost its luster?
I can't say it's lost its luster, as many of the same events take place during the week leading up to the bout. And hey, this is still Las Vegas, and it is still the "Boxing Capital of the World."
But the media has changed, and the attitude toward covering an event is different. Social media hasn't helped and anyone with a smartphone is suddenly welcome, with or without a credential.
Influencers outweigh credible media members who have poured their heart and soul into a career for decades. Fans seem to think Tik-Toks and Instagram Reels tell more than the storytellers.
That doesn't mean the old-school PR teams have lost their touch. They still know what it means to put out a spread and how to treat the media members who have a touch of old-school vibe.
But it's like anything else with some of us self-acclaimed curmudgeons who miss everything about old Las Vegas, we simply miss, uhm, old Las Vegas.
None of that matters, though. There will always be a new wave of journalists, new fighters, new promoters, new PR teams attached to the boxers and at the different venues and new storylines.
But what has lived on for me over 43 1/2 years, since that 89-degree night at Caesars when Holmes empathetically slowed his attack in knowing he had Ali beaten, is what "Fight Night" has always meant, and always will, in Las Vegas.
Riddick "Big Daddy" Bowe (l.) speaks to members of the media before a fight in the early 1990s, including Sporting Tribune writer and columnist W.G. Ramirez (right-center). PHOTO COURTESY: W.G. Ramirez