Arturo\’s Long Road Back.

In 1995, many people regarded Arturo Gatti as one of the best prospects to come along in years. At 25-1, with only one loss coming in 1992 at the beginning of his career to King Solomon, he won the title in dramatic fashion against Tracy Harris Patterson that saw him

garner a split decision victory and the IBF super featherweight title. After five successful defenses, the stars seemed well aligned for dominating runs through the annals of boxing history. But a funny thing happened: fate. Changes in Arturo’s lifestyle (and he will be the first to tell you this) caused him to party hard and fully cherish his title instead of training hard and often. He took the first couple of months off and decided to just go all out the remaining ten weeks before the fight actually started. Enter his down period. After his thrilling knockout win over Gabe Ruelas, which saw him come back from oblivion to pull out a fifth round knockout, he lost three consecutive fights. One to Angel Manfredy, a bad beating stopped on cuts. The next two losses came against Ivan Robinson. They were both close losses, but it was evident that Gatti clearly lost. Gatti then destroyed a lighter Joey Gamache, a fight in which Gamache hit the canvas seven times, suffered serious injuries and retired after the fight. By 2000, Gatti held a reputation as nothing more than a shopworn former champion and it was clear that he was eventually going to retire or stay around for prospects to feed on.

In 2001, Gatti needed money and decided to accept a fight at 147-pounds, facing Oscar de la Hoya who was on his comeback trail and needed a tune-up. Arturo gave a valiant effort but his corner threw in the towel with a little left in the fifth round. Gatti decided that he would not be cannon fodder for hungry prospects; he hired former world champion Buddy McGirt to be his trainer. McGirt stressed discipline as his main goal and quickly began making an impact on Arturo’s fight skills as well as his psyche. In January of 2002, with his unexpected destruction of Terron Millett he was getting looks from all the boxing experts and Max Kellerman even foresaw the unexpected and predicted that Gatti would regain a title back; hogwash as other boxing experts thought. Well, not me.

What began in May of 2002 was the start of a hall-of-fame gem trilogy between him and Micky Ward. This brought the sport to life for a short period of time. After losing a razor-thin majority decision in their first battle, he came back in the next two fights and looked sharper, faster and younger, thus dominating Ward in the second bout and taking a close but unanimous decision in their third fight. This was a resurrected fighter, a better fighter. Stealing a quote from Apollo Creed, “It takes a hell of a man to change, and I’m proud of you.” That might be what trainer Buddy McGirt said to Gatti. That is what these two have been like, almost starting a fairytale run that would continue with a title shot in January of 2004 with Gianluca Branco who was unknown but carrying a 32-0 record. Arturo continued his gusto with a commanding unanimous decision victory and won his first title since 1997. The run was complete but Buddy McGirt was stern on making sure that this was not all they were after and it has been his responsibility to keep the train rolling.

In July of 2004, Gatti defended his title against Leo Dorin who whipped Paul Spadafora (who was undefeated) around in 2003 but was forced to a draw. Dorin, undefeated was thought to surely beat Gatti convincingly but here came Gatti again with an axe-like body shot that almost split the former lightweight titlist in half in the second round. Dorin saw out the count; Gatti was still the champion. The next fight Gatti took was with “Jesse” James Leija who is always a tough fight, and of late, has a history of beating young prospects. Gatti handled him in five, knocking him down twice.

It is now clear that Arturo is a surefire hall-of-famer, and was a long time ago with the only difference being that he is a changed man. I respect him to the fullest by the way he conducts himself as a professional and the way he respects his trainer, Buddy McGirt. I heard him during the second Micky Ward fight saying, “Yes, sir.” How many fighters do you see nowadays that say that to a trainer? Not many. Arturo has always been a person of a good family upbringing and strong character, and after the three Micky Ward battles, those two will be friends for as long as they live. Gatti is the public and people’s champion in boxing today because people love him for the way he carries himself and will never give anything less than his 180 percent in the ring, time in and time out. Here’s to you Arturo for being one of the few great guys in the sport. Floyd Mayweather, watch out.