campbell

Unless you're an avid boxing fan (or you suffer from a chronic addiction to ESPN Classic), you're probably not familiar with the name Arturo Gatti.  That's okay;  Gatti never was much for either fame or acclaim -- he simply did his job and wanted to entertain people.  That he was revered by some seemed to actually mystify him.

Arturo Gatti was found dead this morning at the age of 37.  The circumstances surrounding his death are abnormally mysterious, but to me that isn't the real story here.  The real story is how a man with marginal boxing skill became a legend to a generation of boxing fans.  Gatti didn't do it by winning a trophy case full of world titles, though he was a two-division world champion.  He also didn't do it by possessing awe-inspiring one punch knockout power, though he did score more than his fair share of KOs.  "Thunder" did it by epitomizing another moniker which he increasingly came to be known by:  "The Ultimate Blood & Guts Fighter."

Gatti never danced around the ring or gratuitously evaded his opponent; he never even intimated that these strategies may have occurred to him.  He fought 3 minutes of every round, and if his opponent weren't prepared to do the same, then Gatti would break him.  Gatti was willing to take any punch to land his own, and his face often showed it by the end of his fights -- even (or especially) his victories.  He took more punishment in victory than most fighters do in defeat.  He was known for his remarkable and uncanny ability to recover from the most devastating of pugilistic predicaments and still earn victory.  Gatti was so famous for this that Randy Neumann, the referee in charge of his final bout - a knockout loss to Alfonso Gomez in which Gatti suffered massive punishment - was later quoted as saying that he simply couldn't bring himself to stopping the fight.  He truly believed that at any point Gatti was capable of coming back, simply because of who he was.  Respected trainer Teddy Atlas paraphrased an old associate of his on Friday Night Fights last night, noting that in boxing "will always beats skill."  Gatti's career was living testimony to this maxim. 

Four of Gatti's bouts were named "Fight of the Year" by The Ring Magazine.  Numerous other slugfests further cemented his legacy as the most exciting fighter of his generation.  His epic trilogy with "Irish" Mickey Ward is the stuff of legend.  As for myself, I'll simply remember Arturo as the man who made me a boxing fan, a notion I believe he'd take as the highest compliment possible.