Boxing Blog – TSS Tidbits

Former Olympian Ron Siler violates probation again

Olympic boxer Ron Siler will be sentenced on Sept. 6 and could get a five-year prison term after he violated his probation stemming from a 2002 felony assault charge.

On Aug. 15 Siler, an Ohio resident, was found guilty of disorderly conduct, a misdemeanor charge. Charges of domestic violence and possession of cocaine are still pending.

Siler, now 26, was convicted in 2002 for beating up a contractor – he tried to crush his skull with a hammer – and was sentenced to community service and five years probation. Siler, who insists he didn’t perform the hammer attack, spent nine months in jail for a probation violation, but a judge released him to train for the 2004 Olympics.

“I made an exception,” Judge Nadel told the Cincinnati Enquirer before the 2004 Games. “But he’s still on probation until 2008, and if he doesn’t do what he’s supposed to do, he’s facing six more years.”

Siler was expected to be a medal contender at 112 pounds in Athens, and Emanuel Steward was extremely high on his future prospects.

But the flyweight suffered a second-round loss to Uzbekistan’s Tulashboy Doniyorov and never transitioned into the pro game. Discipline was a severe problem and if one needed another hint besides the hammer attack that something wasn’t right with Siler, the man was stopped by police and cited eight times for driving without a license.

Siler follows in the footsteps of another Ohio-born Olympian, Ricardo Williams Jr.; the silver medalist at the 2000 Games was sentenced to three years in 2005 for conspiracy to distribute cocaine and could be released in February of 2008…

Former fighter, Roger Donoghue, 75, KO’d by Alzheimer’s

Roger Donoghue, the man who taught Marlon Brando to box for the movie ”On the Waterfront,” died on Sunday in Greenport, N.Y., at age 75.

The cause was complications from Alzheimer’s, his wife, Fay Moore, said, according to the NY Times.

The writer Budd Schulberg credited Donoghue with partly inspiring the classic line of ex-pug/whistleblower Terry Malloy, played by Brando: ”I could have been a contender,” for the classic flick “On the Waterfront.”

Donoghue, born in Yonkers, debuted as a pro in 1948. He was a busy boxer in the 150-pound class, during a time when the five boroughs of New York City were all host to club fights on a regular basis.

He fought in Brooklyn and Queens and hit the big time when he gloved up at Madison Square Garden in 1951. Donoghue’s opponent was one George Flores, who he had defeated just two weeks earlier in White Plains, NY, via an eighth round TKO. At MSG, Donoghue defeated Flores again, dispatching him in the eight round via straight KO.

(Tragically, Flores died four days later from injuries sustained during the bout, and the accumulated punishment absorbed during the other two times he had been knocked out within a month’s span.)

Donoghue’s verve for the sport as an active participant dimmed in later years but he still kept his heart in the game, and bragged that Brando, his student, had the goods: ”I’ve got him shooting straight jabs, and he’s already learned to hook off the jab. I can make a hell of a middleweight out of this kid.”

Donoghue retired as a pro in 1952, at age 21, with a 27-4-1 record, and would quite likely have returned one of those wins with eagerness…

Watch Showtime and see whose cornerman is Jesus

Underneath the James Toney/Samuel Peter heavyweight scrap a week from Saturday, there will be an IBF featherweight title fight shown on Showtime for your added enjoyment.

Ohio-born Eric “Mighty Mouse” Aiken, who beat Vlad Pereira in Boston in May to secure the belt, will meet Robert “The Ghost” Guerrero in a battle of born-again Christians.

The 26-year-old Aiken (16-4) comes in with solid momentum, having beaten Tim Austin before Pereira.

Guerrero, a 23-year-old Californian with a 18-1-1 mark, is a southpaw whose only loss was to Gamaliel Diaz in 2005. He avenged the defeat with a sixth-round KO in June.

One nagging question in my mind: both fighters advertise their faith in their lord and savior Jesus Christ. If one man defeats the other, will he determine that Jesus favored the winner more at the Staples Center on Saturday?

Is Jeff “HellRaza� Fraza living down to his name?

It was supposed to be a low-key tribute to a Contender but instead, two men were stabbed at a bash for Massachusetts boxer Jeff “HellRaza” Fraza on Wednesday evening, and one of those stabbed was taken to the hospital and was listed in critical condition.

A police report lists Fraza and another Massachusetts man as suspects in the stabbings of Michael Tang, 27, a former national taekwondo champion, and his brother David Tang, 22, a report in the Lawrence Eagle-Tribune said.

Fraza, 28, of Haverhill denied any involvement in the nasty violence at the barroom.

“It went from being a good night of celebration, a peaceful night, then all hell broke loose,” Fraza said in a telephone interview with the newspaper last night. “I’m trying to be a role model for the kids.”

The other man identified as a suspect in the police report was Fraza’s friend Efrain Crespo, 29, who was expected to be questioned by police last night.

The Tang brothers will also be queried, the cops said, before any arrests are made.

Michael Tang was taken to a Boston hospital by helicopter after being cut while David Tang was treated at Lawrence General Hospital for wounds to his head from being hit with a bottle, puncture wounds to his right side and stab wounds to his chest. He was released from the hospital yesterday, the paper reported.

It seems the Tangs were stabbed trying to break up the fight at River City Billiards at 83 Washington St., according to witness accounts. The brothers have worked as bouncers at the bar in the past but were not on duty for the Fraza fiesta.

About 50 people attended the bash to take in Fraza’s losing boxing bout on ESPN’s “The Contender” Tuesday night. The party continued into the early morning, and as bar workers tried to close at 12:45, a fight erupted near the jukebox, police said. The situation, which may have started when someone accidentally jostled another patron, deteriorated in a manner typically seen in the movies.

The establishment’s owner ID’d Crespo as the man who tried to fill Tang with holes initially, but he then backtracked on his call.

Tang, like Fraza, is a pretty fair athlete. He was looking to make the 2004 US Olympic team in taekwondo, and pared down 70 pounds to compete in the 176-pound division. The weight loss depleted him, however, and his quest ended when he needed medical attention from the severe dieting.