BOOK REVIEW: BLOOD & HATE
“It’s what boxing’s all about,” said Wedge. “It’s these kids that almost have no other opportunity in life, and they run across someone that inspires them and touches them in a way that they can find a way to do something meaningful in their life. And that’s what happened with Marvin and the Petronellis. He was an aimless kid. He had nowhere to go. He finds his way into this gym in Brockton and meets these two guys who he had no reason to have any connection with, and they build this beautiful, amazing, lifelong friendship.” It wasn’t easy. And once that trust was built between the three, it only got harder to navigate a boxing business not ready to accept a no-nonsense southpaw from Brockton who would fight anyone, anywhere, at any time. It forced Hagler to take his show on the road … to Philadelphia. The City of Brotherly Love was
where the Hagler legend truly began to take shape, and Wedge beautifully covers not just the fights the future champion had to take to move somewhere in the division, but the fighters he fought, including Bobby Watts, Willie Monroe, Eugene Hart and Bennie Briscoe. Those fights made a hard man into a man of steel and seemingly prepped him for what was to come. “Every one of these fights back in that era was worth a book,” said Wedge. “Those Philly fights that I write about in this book, it’s world-class stuff. Everyone had a backstory, and there were characters and nuance, and for me as a writer and as a journalist and a storyteller, it’s a lot of fun to dig into these old nuggets of history and kind of bring them forward to the new generation. That’s really what I’m trying to do here.” Eventually, Hagler would get his title
shot, only to receive a draw against champion Vito Antuofermo. The Italian would lose his belt to the other main character in the book, Alan Minter. The Brit has a complicated history, but Wedge tells it fairly, even if pre-fight quotes from Minter saying that he’d never lose his title to a Black man are still cringeworthy decades later. “When I was writing this, I was like, ‘You know what, Alan Minter has a pretty incredible story, and his story needs to be shared in here,’” said Wedge. “Now, does he come off as the archvillain? No, he’s not. But he did some bad stuff and he pissed some people off. His family is aware of that, and it upset them, and Marvin wasn’t happy about it. And obviously the things he said were terrible, but he’s an imperfect human. And him and Marvin had a colossal fight, and then they did reconcile later in life. They weren’t best friends, but they let bygones be bygones.
So I think sharing that story of Minter’s journey is important, too. And again, look at what he went through in Munich [during the Olympic Games], and then he killed a guy in the ring, and that was very traumatic; it changed Alan’s life. His story’s worth telling, too.” [Editor’s note: Angelo Jacopucci, who suffered a 12th-round stoppage to Minter in Italy on July 19, 1978, died three days later from a brain injury sustained during their European middleweight title bout.] Luckily, Wedge was telling it, along with the stories of Hagler, the Petronellis, Rocky Marciano and the cast of characters that made up the boxing world of the 1970s. It was a different time. Some
Minter fought fire with fire against the rampaging Hagler and came in second.
would say better, others would say worse, but “different” definitely covers it. And who better to tell the tale of Hagler than a Brockton native? “I have to say, selfishly, I’m a Brockton guy,” Wedge laughs. “I grew up in Brockton. I believe in Brockton. I wouldn’t have written this book if I wasn’t from Brockton.” You can tell the affection Wedge has for his hometown and the people who called it home just by reading Blood & Hate . And while there are certainly dark times and heavy issues addressed in its pages, telling the often untold tale of one of boxing’s greats had to be easier
than writing about the likes of Whitey Bulger, the last days of John Lennon and the Boston Marathon bombing. “I have written about a lot of dark subjects, and it was nice to not be writing something dark, although there is a true crime edge to this book in the racism angle and what happened at Wembley after Marvin won,” said Wedge. “But it’s a story of triumph. What I like to say is Marvin wasn’t Bill Russell, he wasn’t Muhammad Ali, he wasn’t Jesse Owens. He didn’t raise his fist on the podium at the Olympics. He didn’t march in the streets, arm in arm with civil rights leaders. But I call him
the unlikely civil rights hero because he did go into England and fight this guy who was backed by a racist white power group. The guy [Minter] makes a horrible racist comment, and he [Hagler] literally fought racism and he won. So I think that’s an important story to share. He was a quiet leader in that aspect. And if that’s one message people take away, I think that’s a good one.”
Most thought Hagler was robbed in his draw with Vito Antuofermo in 1979.
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