May 10, 2005 – The Kennel Club in Sarasota, Florida
“I’ll fight China Smith any time, any place,” McCall boldly insists to a local Sarasota radio host. “If he fails to accept my challenge, how could he possibly face the fans in this wonderful town?”
Just hours earlier, McCall knocked out journeyman Kelvin Hale at the Sarasota Kennel Club, and the former Heavyweight Champion of the World was doing his best to try to wrangle a fight with local heavyweight Smith, who isn’t listed among the top 100 fighters in Florida, China or anywhere in the world.
Normally, McCall wouldn’t sink to calling out a journeyman. But “The Atomic Bull” is getting desperate. Since his 10-round decision loss to Davarryl Williamson in November 2004, his career seems to be on its last legs.
“I tore a muscle in my left armpit around the fifth round, and it altered the way I fought,” McCall says, referring to the Williamson bout. “It caused me to get hit more than usual.”
The 40-year-old said he considered retirement after the loss, but he came back to win three straight fights this year. And, in the days leading up to the Hale bout, there were even rumors floating around that Don King had gotten in touch with McCall about appearing on the undercard of World Boxing Organization Heavyweight Champion Lamon Brewster’s title defense against Andrew Golota in Chicago.
Unfortunately, with the card less than two weeks away, an opponent for McCall couldn’t be found and those plans were scrapped.
To make matters worse, Henry Grooms, a small-time manager who handles China Smith, issued a statement shortly after McCall’s on-air challenge which read simply: “Oliver McCall doesn’t fit in our plans.”
If there was a rock bottom, McCall was squatting just a few feet above it.
May 21, 2005 – The United Center, Chicago, Illinois
“That bastard shouldn’t be allowed to breed!” a man yelled in broken English.
As thousands of angry Polish fans streamed out of the United Center in Chicago following Andrew Golota’s 52-second annihilation at the hands of Lamon Brewster, clusters of men with their faces painted white and red – who had spent the past several hours chanting “Polska! Polska!” at the top of their lungs – were blind with rage.
Golota had let them down, again.
And while there seemed to be plenty of police on hand to keep everyone moving toward the exits, at least one man was laid out on the staircase with his head split open – no doubt a Brewster fan who misjudged the mood of the people around him.
Despite everyone’s obvious disappointment, though, once Don King and Chicago Blackhawks owner Bill Wirtz finished counting their live gate receipts, there was no question the spiky-haired promoter would return to the Windy City to stage another card.
The only problem was, with new WBC light heavyweight champ and fellow Pole Tomasz Adamek on the shelf with a severely broken nose – thanks to his epic war with Paul Briggs on the undercard – King felt he needed a “name” Polish boxer who could help bring the fans back.
He also wondered how he could make another Golota fight sound appealing to those who wanted to castrate their former idol.
July 19, 2005—Playboy Enterprises, Chicago, Illinois
A fairly large contingent of sportswriters and photographers brave the traffic and the stifling heat to attend a mid-morning press conference in downtown Chicago for the announcement of King’s “Global Glory” pay-per-view show at the United Center on Aug. 13.
Typically, an event like this wouldn’t draw much attention by mainstream media. But sensing that his next promotion needed a little sex appeal, King hosted the event in the corporate headquarters of Playboy Enterprises.
There was even a centerfold present.
Kasia Kraszewska (all 5’10’ and 110 lbs of her) shared the dais with King and the two Polish heavyweights scheduled to meet on that August card – Golota and Przemyslaw Saleta. Having graced the cover of the March 2005 issue of Polish Playboy, Kraszewska was in town for a photo shoot with the U.S. version of magazine. As luck would have it, she also happened to be the longtime girlfriend of Saleta, who hovered over the young woman like any fighter would while dozens of copies of her nude photos were handed out to the blushing media.
Amidst all the titillation, no one appeared to notice the enormous, square-jawed fellow hunched on the stage, sporting a pair of sunglasses and a scowl that would frighten anyone with an ounce of intelligence.
Andrew Golota was not pleased.
Since joining King’s stable of boxers, Golota had completely embraced the promotional side of the sport. He’d boxed “Benny the Bull” at a Chicago Bulls playoff game and rattled off jokes to reporters as if he were auditioning for Second City’s comedy troupe.
But the press conference at Playboy struck a nerve. The event was clearly a showcase for Saleta and his girlfriend, and Golota got the impression he was being shown the door.
After the couple finished mugging for photographers, Golota took the microphone and injected a little violence back into the show.
“I was supposed to fight him in Poland five years ago,” he growled, nodding in Saleta’s direction. “He said a lot of bad things about me as a commentator on Polish T.V.”
With contempt in his face, Golota leaned in and sneered, “I hate him.”
Saleta just smiled.
“I changed sports because I felt I’d accomplished everything there was to achieve,” said Saleta, a former national, European and world kickboxing champ – who defeated Vitali Klitschko in a kickboxing match in 1989. “I’ve always known I was just as good as any fighter in the world. Other guys, like Golota, just had better promoters.”
August 3, 2005 –Sarasota, Florida
“I still feel bad that I did it.”
Despite compiling a 38-1 amateur record, registering a stunning knockout over Lennox Lewis to win the WBC heavyweight championship, and beating big-name opponents like Larry Holmes, Bruce Seldon and Henry Akinwande, McCall will forever be remembered as the man who “broke down and cried’ during the middle of his rematch with Lewis at the Las Vegas Hilton in 1997.
“I let some things get to me, and I let myself down,” he says now, leaving it at that.
Most fans saw the rematch with Lewis as relatively even going into the third round when McCall, for unexplained reasons, stopped fighting. For two more rounds, McCall circled the ring refusing to throw punches. During the one-minute rest periods, tears would stream down his face and he’d openly sob.
Midway through the fifth, referee Mills Lane finally stopped the fight and awarded the title to Lewis. McCall was immediately suspended and fined $250,000 by the New York State Athletic Commission. Days later, his wife of 20 years, Alethia, had him committed to a psychiatric hospital.
But McCall says the real low point in his life came when he was jailed for violating his probation in 2001 (for an earlier assault conviction). His father, Henry, an avid boxing fan who gave him the name “Atomic Bull,” died while he was behind bars. McCall was granted a pass for a few hours to attend the funeral.
When he was released, he went back to the only place in his life that had structure … the ring.
“Some of that stuff still happens,” McCall admits. “But it doesn’t happen in the ring anymore. I’m just trying to keep my head together, stay strong, and say no to drugs and alcohol. It’s not easy. When I deviate from that, I really deviate.”
Prison stints and relapses aside, McCall has quietly run off 16 wins, with only one loss (to Williamson in November), since the breakdown against Lewis.
Typically, a winning streak like that would get a heavyweight ranked by someone. However, the sanctioning organizations seem to be as gun-shy around McCall as most boxers are.
But all that changed on Aug. 2, when reports out of the Windy City Gym claimed Andrew Golota had suffered a bad cut on his right eyebrow during a sparring session. A couple hours later, McCall’s phone began to ring.
The voice on the other end asked a simple question: “How would you like to fight Saleta?”
For a moment, at least, Sarasota seemed a million miles away.
See Backyard Brawl: Oliver McCall Conquers Poland (Part 3)
See Backyard Brawl: Oquendo Points Fingers After Losing to McCall (Part 4)
See Backyard Brawl: Oliver McCall’s Last Shot (Part 1)
