Antwun Echols and the Curse of Being a Good Boxer

I was watching the documentary, Counterpunch, on Netflix this past week, and as I was following these three boxers at different stages of their career, it sent me down a Wikipedia rabbit hole of boxers. It took a lot of twists and turns and eventually led me to the Wikipedia page for Antwun Echols. Now unless you are a hardcore boxing fan or from Davenport, Iowa, that name probably doesn't mean anything to you. But I'm a part of that latter group, so I remember him coming up and being one hell of a boxer.

And he was. After losing his very first fight, he would go on to lose once in his next 24 fights. That was enough for him to earn a shot at Bernard Hopkins, who he took the distance but Echols lost the decision. He ended up winning his next two fights to get another shot at Hopkins, but this time he was stopped in the tenth round. Still, that's Bernard Hopkins, one of the greatest fighters of his generation and Echols was competitive in both fights.

Even after that, he managed to win seven of his next eight fights, winning the NABF Super Middleweight Title but losing his chance at the WBA Super Middleweight Title. Still, at this point, he had amassed a 31-5-1 record which isn't going to make him one of the greats, but it's still a pretty damn good career. 

Unfortunately, Echols career continued, as he has had another 22 fights since then. Echols was no longer the young up-and-comer who was smashing stepping stones on his way to title shots. Now, he was the stepping stone, continually put against top prospects. The fights got worse and worse as he went from losing decisions to losing by knockout. He has gone 1-18-3 in those last 22 fights. His one win was against a fighter who had a record of 0-8-2, but Fred Thomas is now 1-15-2, so Echols may have been lucky to meet him before Thomas reached his prime. Probably his most impressive accomplishment in this run is getting knocked out in the third round in seven consecutive fights, a streak that was ended when he lost in 8 seconds in his last fight.

As if that wasn't bad enough, during this run of awful fights, he was also shot in the leg trying to break up a fight. Then, he was immediately arrested at the hospital for possession of crack and failure to pay child support.

And about that child support, despite being busy with a boxing career, that did not stop Echols from getting busy in other ways. In 2013, Echols said in an interview that he "thinks" he has 23 kids. Maybe saddest of all, but definitely most delusional of all, is that when Echols was on a run of 1-14-3, he still had title aspirations. 

Echols had a great career, fighting for multiple championships but never bringing home the big time titles. Then he had a second career as a punching bag, and nobody was there to tell him that even if the money was decent, it's not a real career. But promoters were willing to keep giving him opportunity, because he was a good name in the boxing community. It didn't matter that he was no longer the same guy; it was actually better. He was the perfect stepping stone. The guy has clearly taken so much damage that he's susceptible to being knocked out by anyone, and that is exactly what's happened.

This story is about Antwun Echols, but it could easily be about dozens of other boxers that hang on for far too long with nobody around them willing or convincing enough to step in and stop them. Antwun Echols rose up from nothing to make something of himself through boxing. Now it appears that boxing will bring him right back to where he started. It's nearly impossible to see a happy ending to this story, so at this point, I'm just hoping for one that isn't tragic.

Little Kids Love Pro Wrestling

So we had two young children staying at our house this week, and I learned a lot through the experience. The 7-month-old and me didn't really do much interacting. She wasn't that interested in me, and honestly, I wasn't that interested in her either. Triple B yo, Babies Be Boring. But the 3-year-old and me were more on the same wavelength. Does this mean I think like a toddler? Yes, yes it does, and I am not ashamed by that.

Anyway, I used this opportunity to poison the future potential of this country by exposing this child to pro wrestling, because of course I was going to show a 3-year-old how awesome pro wrestling is. I mean, his parents knew I was going to do it when they left, and my wife knew I was going to do it too. It was just a matter of finding the right opportunity. I kept asking if he wanted to watch wrestling, but he just kept wanting to watch episodes of the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (which I will have hot takes on in the near future). Our conversations kept going like this:

Me: You want to watch wrestling?
Him: Turtles.
Me: But wrestling is super cool.
Him: Turtles.
Me (under my breath): Damnit.

This conversation happened about a half dozen times before I finally found my opening when he was putting out (imaginary) fires throughout the house. I put on Raw, but he was more playing with his trucks than actually watching. Then, Kevin Owens wrestled Neville, and it finally caught his attention and hooked him. With all of Neville's flips, he was entranced with the show. There were a bunch of near falls, and I tried to explain a 3-count to him (the pinfall type, not the boy band type), and he kind of nodded his head to make me think he understood.

Then I was sitting on the couch, and I hear him go, "1...2...3!" before jumping on my back and choking me. He did not totally understand a 3-count, but he sure did enjoy counting to three and trying to beat me up, and that's really the most important aspect of pro wrestling.

Eventually, my wife made us stop fighting, because we were being loud as he attacked, and I flipped him onto the couch, showing my dominance of 3-year-olds. She threatened that I'd have to take care of the baby if we woke it up, and that was definitely enough for me to turn off wrestling and go back to Ninja Turtles. God, wives are so lame.

So will the love of pro wrestling blossom? The bad news is that I don't think his parents want to be stuck watching pro wrestling, but the good news is that he was bragging to his parents that he beat me up when we watched wrestling. Oh, that sweet high of carefree violence. That'll get any kid coming back for more.

Pro wrestling is the best.

The Florida State League: Where Nobody Shows Up And Dreams Come True

As a former employee of a minor league team, I am a huge proponent of minor league baseball. It's cheap, it's fun, and you get to be outside in (usually) nice weather. That's a pretty good combination. These minor league games don't have the crowds you would see in the majors, but most places still average a few thousand a game. Weirdly, most places does not include the Florida State League.

Going to games in the Florida State League is like entering into a weird alternative universe where baseball is as popular as darts. It is a ghost town at these games, as they are attended sparingly, and not much goes on besides baseball. It's probably an old sportswriter's wet dream as it is baseball without any sort of flash or showmanship, just plain ol' baseball.

Now don't get me wrong. Baseball is fine. But it can be a little slow, and it could use a little something extra to fill in the gaps. So why doesn't Florida support minor league baseball? I mean, it's full of old people, and old people love baseball. But these Floridians are spoiled, as they only like to go to Spring Training games where they can see fancy major league baseball players instead of the gritty, young hustlers working their way up the ladder.

So nobody shows up. I mean, not nobody, but probably around 100 people. And these people are missing out, because it's kind of amazing. It's this wonderful ghost town where, even though it is not major leaguers, great baseball is played. And considering the home team always throws the ball in the stands, every kid gets to go home with a baseball that was given to someone who they think is larger than life. And yeah, maybe that guy will never see Double-A, but there's also the chance that he's a future All-Star. Hell, a third of the kids get to go out to the field for some goofy minor league baseball contest.

You can hear and see everything. And the more I thought about it, the more I realized I enjoyed it. A kid got six foul balls at a game. SIX. Another brought a glove, and had a player toss him a ball. One little girl got asked to race the mascot, and her Dad's reaction displayed joy that many have not felt since they were a child. It was amazing, because the little girl was unsure about doing it, but her Dad was so genuinely excited that she had to go for it.

When I started writing this piece, I titled it, "Minor League Baseball in Florida Gave Me a Preview of the Apocalypse." It wasn't catchy, but it seemed apt at the time. After I thought about it for a while, I realized that even though it wasn't well attended, there was still a lot of life at these games. From an outsider's perspective, it looks dead, but upon closer examination, it's actually kind of wonderful.