Still a Champ: 54-Year-Old Saoul Mamby Wants Another Chance at a Boxing Title
Saoul Mamby still has the dreams of his youth. He wants to box for a world championship. This has some of his friends worried. They still think he's a badass and can handle himself in the ring. It's just that at 54 years of age they think Mamby is fooling himself. Time is cruel to all boxers?especially boxers who continue to fight well after their prime. But no one is going to change Mamby's mind. With a hungry eye, he watches today's undisciplined young boxers and sees a big payday.
Mamby walks into Gleason's Gym in downtown Brooklyn looking like the WBC Junior Welterweight Champion he once was. On the wall is a b&w photo from 1981 of Mamby striking the classic boxing pose. Twenty years later he hasn't changed much. He would be right at home with the hiphop generation, wearing a white doo-rag, loose shirt and dungarees and sneakers. If someone told you he was in his 30s you'd believe him.
"I feel real good. I train every day. I made that a part of my life. That is a secret of success. You have to do it every day. You can't train hard for six months and then take off. It has to be every day."
Mamby's a small man and doesn't seem imposing until you shake his hand. They're oversized hands that look like they could break rocks. He was born June 4, 1947, raised in the Bronx, and still lives there; never left, even when he was champion. Sitting down at a worn table as two huge heavyweights sparred, he spoke quietly and almost shyly.
"It's not like I'm stuck there or anything. I've been places. I've been all around the world. It ain't like I love the Bronx or New York. I like it. It's just home is all."
Mamby had a tough childhood, and it only got harder when his mother converted and then raised him as a black Hebrew.
"We were the only Hebrews around that part of the Bronx. I got picked on because come Saturday I'd be running around wearing a yarmulke and waiting to go to Temple. No one else was Hebrew but us."
The streets of the Bronx taught Mamby to be a fighter. It would be many years until he became a boxer.
"As a kid I wanted to be a strong man. You know how the back of comics had those advertisements by Charles Atlas with the big bully kicking sand on the skinny kid? For a dime they would send you these exercises that made you strong. Well I did those exercises for years and I did become strong."
Mamby banged around the Bronx, getting into fights and winning medals as a gymnast for his high school. When he graduated, a unique federal career was forced upon him, one that a lot of Bronx kids would have to take: in 1967 he was drafted and sent to Vietnam.
He doesn't really want to talk about it. "That was just hell. People tell me to go to hell, I laugh. I tell them I already been there."
By 1969 he was back in the Bronx and he wasn't doing much of anything. His sister became concerned and took him down to Jamaica on what was supposed to be a three-day vacation. It turned into two years. One day Mamby was drinking Red Stripe on a beach when he saw a poster for a boxing match. He had done his share of brawling and figured it was a good way to make money. He joined a gym, and had his first professional fight in September 1969. He won by knockout and found his calling.
"I came back to New York and got serious. My trainer told me that I had a lot of heart, but I had to learn how to be a boxer. He was right. I did learn, but it took 11 years of hardship and sacrifice."
After years of building up a solid career, at 32 Mamby finally got a shot at a title. In 1979 he beat Sang-Hyun Kim for the WBC Junior Welterweight Championship.
When asked how he felt as a champion his whole body changes. He sits up and beams, "Oh, it was great. You feel wonderful as a champion. It was beautiful. I bought my jewelry, my mink, my cars, but I didn't blow my money as champ, because it took so long to get there."
Mamby stayed in the Bronx as a champ. He had an apartment in the Tracy Towers?two huge buildings in the north of the borough where he still lives. He was the pride of the Bronx. I later talked with a cop?who asked to remain nameless?who worked in Mamby's precinct.
"Oh, yeah. I remember good old Saoul Mamby. He had some fine women. Women you just couldn't believe how good-looking they were. Take your breath away. Exotic, like models. They'd be out driving his Caddy?and it wasn't just any Caddy, but it had the silver wheels and it was all souped up. The top of the line. His car had the license plate 'Mamby' and the young girls drove reckless. When they were pulled over they would tell us that Saoul let them use the car."
Mamby laughs when I ask if he was ever married.
"Nah, I ain't doing that to myself. I do have five kids."
We talk about his glory years; how he held the title for two years and defended his crown with a lot of overseas bouts.
"I found I got more respect around the world than I did in New York. They appreciate what I did. Here they are always looking for the new kid."
Mamby lost his title in 1982, then became a journeyman fighter. He'd book four or five fights a year, won some and lost some. The purses grew smaller as he aged.
Now he's 54, training other fighters and looking for one last shot at a title. I asked him if he wasn't getting a little long in the tooth to still be in the ring.
"I know a lot of people say that, but I am still in great shape. I'm still a good boxer. I won my last fight. I'll tell you, when I was over in Vietnam I watched these old men with long white beards doing martial arts. They were incredible. The best. They were the oldest men in the village and none of the young men could beat them. If they could do it, so can I."
Mamby walked away and got in the ring with a Japanese woman he was training. He was working on her stance. I gave him a wave and he smiled. He looked like he was home.