I found this on another forum,I know I have no link but all credit goes to the original guy who posted it.Try and read it all. *EDIT I FOUND A LINK* http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports...ck=1&cset=true
Glory a dim memory
Once the youngest fighter to win 3 world titles, Wilfred Benitez struggles with boxer's dementia and lives in poverty with his mother
By Ray Quintanilla | Tribune staff reporter
December 20, 2007
CAROLINA, Puerto Rico - He relies on his mother to get out of bed each morning. Once on his feet, he finds balance along a wall and plods carefully into the living room.
Clara Benitez stands a few feet away, watching carefully, like a parent teaching a child to take his first steps. Her 49-year-old son is nearly blind. He moves as if his feet weigh 100 pounds each. The ringing in his ears makes it nearly impossible for him to hear, and his battle against confusion seems to get worse every day.
"Where am I?" he asks in garbled Spanish before plopping down in front of a blaring television one morning at home in an impoverished neighborhood. "What have you done with my mother? What is my name?"
This is Wilfred Benitez, once the youngest professional fighter to win three boxing world titles. During his heyday he was a source of inspiration and pride for Latinos around the world. Nowhere is his popularity greater than on this Caribbean island, where the son of the late Puerto Rican baseball legend Roberto Clemente calls him "an iconic sports figure."
But boxer's dementia, a condition brought on by too many powerful blows to the head, has robbed Benitez of nearly everything. The fighter once known as "El Radar" is unable to care for himself. He and his mother occupy a two-bedroom concrete house in a depressed section of Carolina, a community about 10 miles outside San Juan.With mounting financial problems and no one but an elderly parent to care for him, he is in danger of becoming homeless once his mother has gone.
The former fighter receives a combined $1,100 a month in public assistance from the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and the town of Carolina. His mother says it's barely enough to cover the cost of utilities, housing and food for them on this pricey island. The Wilfred Benitez Foundation, started a few years ago, has generated no more than a few hundred dollars a year from sales of fight memorabilia, she adds.
Days after Benitez's mother turned 81 in October, she acknowledged being haunted by some painful questions: "Who is going to care for Wilfred when I pass on?" she laments, her eyes welling up as she glances at her son sitting quietly on a sofa, the way he did as a little boy.
"Will my son end up on the streets? It worries me every day," she adds.
The family has tried to keep its financial difficulties private for much of the last decade. But it's getting more difficult to hide, the former fighter's mother says. Their home has plumbing problems they cannot afford to repair. They have endured days with no water or electricity because of unpaid utility bills.
The fighter's mother said she isn't sure how much money he earned over 62 professional fights in his 17-year career, but "several million" sounds right. What she does know, she added, is that her late husband, Gregorio, who managed their son and kept his financial records, squandered much of those winnings purchasing racehorses. The fighter's father died in 1996. What was left of the prize money dried up about five years ago -- and with it, his 24-hour nursing care, his mother adds. He was diagnosed with diabetes about three years ago.
Selling the roof for food
Earlier this year, Clara Benitez sold a section of their home's metal roof to a scrap dealer for $200 -- money they used for food.
"About all we have left is each other," she says, reflecting on her son's stellar career, which ended in 1990. Neither her son's former wife nor his daughter visits the former champion.
"He would have been better off without boxing," she says. "Wilfred was a loving person, but his illness has made him so distant, like it's not really him sitting on the sofa anymore. He can't do anything on his own."
The Benitez family -- eight children in all -- left New York City for Puerto Rico in the mid-1970s. They bought a small home in Carolina, and before Benitez was shaving, he was spending hours in the local gym honing his skills.
His two older brothers, Frankie and Gregory, also were boxers, though neither reached their youngest sibling's popularity or fame.
By age 15, Wilfred Benitez was ranked among the world's top fighters.
Two years later, in 1976, Benitez became the youngest fighter to win a world title by battering Antonio "Kid Pambele" Cervantes for 15 rounds in a packed San Juan outdoor stadium -- an upset fight fans still talk about in local bars and social clubs. Indeed, when he fought Kid Pambele, he entered the ring with the weight of the island on his shoulders.
During 17 years in the ring, much of it as a welterweight, Benitez earned 53 wins, 31 by knockout. He remains one of the few boxers ever to win three boxing world titles, accomplishments that sparked parades in San Juan.
But his bouts against a handful of the world's best fighters left Benitez with early signs of brain damage, his mother says.
In 1979, Benitez and Sugar Ray Leonard traded blows for nearly 15 rounds before Leonard won by knockout in a battle some rank among boxing's greatest.
Three years later, Benitez went 15 rounds against Roberto "Manos de Piedra" (Spanish for "hands of stone") Duran before winning a unanimous decision and capturing the super welterweight title.
In the fall of 1986, he lost a bruising fight in Argentina that his mother says should have been his last because the dementia was already making life difficult.
When the bout was over, a promoter fled with Benitez's earnings and passport, leaving him stranded and broke, his mother says.
He wandered Buenos Aires streets for months until someone recognized him and called Puerto Rican officials.
When he arrived back on the island, his mother recalls, she told him "Wilfred, this must stop! No more. This boxing must stop!'"
Comeback despite damage
But without boxing, there would be no money for them to live on, he reasoned. So after a three-year respite, Benitez launched a comeback while desperately trying to hide the brain damage that made it difficult for him to speak, causing prolonged periods of stuttering and spells of forgetfulness.
Though he managed to win one of his last three fights, Benitez returned to Puerto Rico barely able to say his name.
Up to 40 percent of former fighters, most famously Muhammad Ali, have been found to suffer with symptoms of chronic brain injury, according to the American Association of Neurological Surgeons. The surgeons group says a blow to the head from a professional fighter can be as powerful as being struck with a 13-pound bowling ball traveling at 20 m.p.h.
Luis Roberto Clemente, son of the late Pittsburgh Pirates outfielder Roberto Clemente, calls Benitez one of the most important athletes in Puerto Rico and the United States.
"This is a man who brought a lot of glory" to Puerto Ricans, especially during the 1970s and '80s, when the island was enduring rampant unemployment and other hardships, says Clemente, 41.
"This poor man has been through so much," says Marvin Montaez Pagan, a family friend who travels to the former fighter's house every month to cut his hair for free. "The worst part will be the day Mrs. Benitez leaves us, because Wilfred will be on his own."
I'd like to say it's saddening that guys like Trinidad,Cotto and any other wealthy PR boxers are not helping out,whenever they have an interview,they are always asked who are you inspirations etc and they always say Benitez,Gomez etc. Why not go and help Wilfred>?
This story also shows what side effects boxing has and what toll it can take on a fighter.He gave us all those awesome fights and memories and has nothing to show for it.I also feel for his mother! Someone should be taking care of her!
