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Boxing Personalities Remember “My Greatest Moment in Another Sport”
- University of Arkansas Press
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Continuing a tradition from years past, the memories of fighters and others in the sweet science who spoke fondly of their greatest moment in a sport other than boxing follow. Boxing Personalities Remember “My Greatest Moment in Another Sport” ARTIE PELULLO It wasn’t just my greatest moments in sports. Outside of getting married and my children being born, it was the greatest moment of my life. I went to Cheltenham High School, which is a public high school in Pennsylvania. Cheltenham’s biggest rival is Abington High School.The Cheltenham-Abington rivalry is one of the oldest football rivalries in Pennsylvania. In 1973, my senior year of high school, I played both ways. Guard on defense and tackle on offense. I was a bull. I weighed 240 pounds and could bench press 260. I made first team all-area and second team allstate . The game was at Abington. Each team had a 7-and-2 record, but what really mattered was beating Abington. For anyone who went to either school, it was like the Army-Navy game. There were nine thousand people in the stands.With forty-five seconds left to play, we were winning 15–14.Abington had the ball on our twenty-yard-line and lined up for a field goal. I was in the gap and took off at the exact moment of the snap.The holder put the ball down. I’m barreling toward the kicker and something in my head says,“Put your hands up, idiot.” So I put my arms up in the air.The ball hits my right forearm.And the crowd goes crazy. My teammates mobbed me on the sideline. I felt so good, and it only got better. On the bus going back to Cheltenham after the game, the coach stood up and said, “Artie; I think this belongs to you.Then he flipped the game ball to me.And at the dance in the high-school gym that STRAIGHT WRITES AND JABS 113 night, Janet McPhee, who was very hot, slow-danced with me.You can put that in your article. But if you do, also put in that my wife and I have been married for thirty-one years and I’m the luckiest husband in the world. TIM BRADLEY It was at the district track meet when I was in seventh grade at Raymond Cree Middle School [in Palm Springs, California]. Every school in the district was there. Each team had three runners entered in the mile run.There were other guys who were favored over me.At first, I was in the pack and tried to work my way to the front but got blocked in. By the start of the last lap, I was running second. I was tired but I was used to pushing myself. I caught the leader on the final turn and we battled stride-for-stride to the very end. I was hurting; I could hardly breathe. But I wanted it so bad. It was like I gave everything I had and then I found something more to give. It was close but I edged him. I felt very proud of myself for winning that race. I felt like the man. STEVE FARHOOD I’ve been very involved in paddle tennis since I was in my teens. There are courts in the building complex that I’ve lived in since I was in junior high school. I love the game. Paddle tennis is basically tennis.The difference is that you play with a paddle instead of a racket; the court is about one-third the size of a regulation tennis court; the ball, which is a regular tennis ball, is punctured with a needle to deaden it, and you serve underhand. In 1981, when I was twenty-four years old, I played in the United States Paddle Tennis Association men’s national doubles championship tournament.A friend named Dave Diamond was my partner.There were about twenty teams in the tournament. Dave and I were underdogs in every match, but we played well and made it to the semifinals.We were massive underdogs in that one, but we were in a zone.We won in straight sets. It was the best we’d ever played. That was on a Saturday morning.After the match, I got on a plane and flew to Boston to cover Marvin Hagler beatingVito Antoufermo at 114 THOMAS HAUSER [34.201.37.128] Project MUSE (2024...