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February 1999
Each month we bring you a selection of articles from the current and past issues of BOXING MONTHLY. To buy the magazine, see our subscription or back issues pages, or use our world distribution map to find a news-stand copy. Why not use our Interactive Forum to express your own boxing comments and opinions!
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READY TO EXPLODE
Terminally depressed and angry, punk singer Jill Matthews is a female boxing stat in waiting |
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THE ZION LION: the best argument yet that women deserve the opportunity to box
- Get Big Pic "I don't have female friends," says Jill Matthews, who looks every inch
the female in her silver nail polish, tight black jump-suit, and curly, flowing locks. At
first impression, it's convenient to dismiss Matthews, who bills herself as "The
Zion Lion" (and not Lioness), as a self-absorbed intruder in the male-dominated
worlds of punk rock and boxing. But watch her fight, and hear her out, and you learn
she's something much more than that. In fact, forget Christy Martin's crushing
KOs and Lucia Rijker's educated skills. Matthews, the junior flyweight champion of a
pair of female alphabet bodies, is the best argument yet that women deserve the
opportunity to box. Or in Matthews's case, need the opportunity. Two days before Christmas, I watched Matthews, 34, spar with a 41-year-old former
fighter named Charlie Ruiz at the Blue Velvet Boxing Club in New York City. Ruiz
outweighed Matthews by 20 pounds, but that didn't seem to faze David Turetsky,
Matthews's husband and manager, the drummer of her punk rock band Times Square, and
during traditional hours, a Park Avenue labour attorney. "Watching her get hit is
hard," acknowledged Turetsky. "But seeing her hit someone is satisfying."
Matthews, a southpaw, was doing most of the hitting, backing Ruiz to the ropes and
unloading under the watchful eye of her trainer, Lennox Blackmoore. Her punches seemed
tame until I realised I was watching a 105-pound woman. What was I expecting, Earnie
Shavers? "Jill has learned how to box, how to slip punches," said Blackmoore, a former
Commonwealth lightweight champion from Guyana who challenged world welterweight champion
Aaron Pryor in 1981. "Before she was just a brawler. She'd come in and throw her
hands like an amateur." Try as he might, Blackmoore isn't going to develop a female Willie Pep. A stylist?
Well, Matthews does cut and shape hair for a living. But defence is a novel concept,
something to consider in the gym. When Matthews exaggeratedly bent at the knees to slip
her sparmate's punches, a la Pernell Whitaker, she seemed to be showing off. Come
fight time, however, it's strictly in-your-face. "I'd rather win a brawl
that win nice and easy by outboxing somebody," she said. "My first and only time
on TV, I fought [England's] Lisa Houghton, and they stopped it in the fourth round. I
think they should've let it go until someone was face-down on the canvas." Matthews hasn't fought since halting Houghton in June, primarily because, as
Turetsky put it, "the bottom of women's boxing has fallen out". The
Houghton bout was the co-feature of an all-female card aired on the USA Network's
"Tuesday Night Fights". After a run of 17 years, that series was cancelled in
August. ESPN2 recently began a weekly series, but Russell Peltz (house promoter at the
Blue Horizon in Philadelphia) makes the matches, and Matthews isn't waiting by the
phone. "I'm not a big fan of female boxers," said traditionalist Peltz.
"I'm in the business of men's boxing, and the dates on ESPN2 are very
valuable, every one of them. If ESPN2 were to come to me and insist I use female boxers,
I'd do it. But they know my feelings. I made them clear when I first made my proposal
last August." To date, Matthews's biggest purse was $10,000, which she received for the Houghton
bout, as well as her title-winning 10-round decision over Anissa Zamarron last March. The
latter fight was promoted by Diane Fischer, who owns a hair salon and boutique at the
Tropicana Hotel in Atlantic City. Fischer has promoted five all-female cards, including a
pay-per-view show, and lost money on every one of them. "It's a shame because the fans really like women's fights," said
Fischer. "But TV is telling me they want mostly men, so I'm trying to do
half-and-half cards. On the undercards, women get more money than the men, and to put on a
show without television money, just using ticket sales, won't do it. "Jill is
unbelievable. The first time with Zamarron, they just kept fighting and fighting. Then the
first six rounds of the next fight, it was the same thing. I'm promoting a show on
January 29 at the Trop, but I can't use Jill because I can't afford her." What about those who can afford Matthews? It's not as if the major promoters have
shut women out; Bob Arum has been featuring Rijker and Mia St. John, the former because
she can break bones with her fists, and the latter because she can break hearts with her
looks. "Jill is somebody I would certainly use on a show, but right now the market
for female boxing isn't that great," said Ron Katz, Arum's East Coast
matchmaker. "There's not a huge outlet." "At one point we talked to a
representative of Don King," reported Turetsky. "Basically, it would have been
signing away your life, for less money, and maybe, maybe Jill becomes the next Christy
Martin." Regardless of who promotes her, Matthews needs a fight, if not for her own
sake, for her husband's sanity. "Jill is a very anxious person," said Turetsky. "She's always
thinking about a million things. Sometimes she has trouble sleeping, sometimes she gets
depressed. Two weeks before a fight is the most relaxed I've ever seen her, the most
satisfied. She's the happiest person in the world." When I asked Matthews why
singing and performing in her band doesn't give her the same high as boxing, she
answered: "Because I think I suck at it." (Nonetheless, Times Square's CD,
"Learn It", accompanies Matthews's press kit.) As we talked in a coffee
shop near the gym, Matthews allowed me to play Freud a bit longer. "I'm an angry, depressed person that goofs around a lot," she said.
"I was born and raised in tough neighbourhoods, the only white girl and from a Jewish
family, and you get stereotyped. People look at me and assume I'm boxing for kicks.
They don't know I'll fight to the fucking death. If I bust someone up, do I
enjoy it? Yeah. It's either me or her. It's my way of showing the world what I can do. "When a fight gets cancelled,
it feels like someone in my family died. It's the worst depression ever. Nothing
fulfils me like boxing. I get more enjoyment in 10 rounds than people get in their entire
lives. If I'm not fighting, I'm worth nothing." In a previous interview,
Matthews said: "My mother's name I can give you, and that's about it:
Marilyn Matthews. My father's name [was] different every week." Born and raised in Manhattan, Matthews was always reminded she was different; she was
white and Jewish in a high school filled with black, Hispanic, and Chinese students, and
she was far more interested in the company of men than women. "I hate women,"
she said. "I always say I'm a homosexual male trapped in a woman's
body." And I thought Naseem Hamed was quotable. When she wasn't trying to match
her brother's output of sit-ups and push-ups, Matthews was immersed in gymnastics.
"I spent my entire teenage years in the gym," she recalled. "It was my
reason for living. And I got nothing out of it." Well, she got something out of it: bulimia. Maybe that's why, after 15 years of a
class or two at a time, she recently received her college degree in nutrition. Matthews
has always been a fitness freak, and at age 30, she advanced from boxing aerobics classes
at an exercise studio to workouts at the white-collar Wall Street Boxing Club. In the
spring of '95, Matthews drove her in-laws crazy (Turetsky's father is a rabbi)
by entering the New York Golden Gloves competition. Two quickie KOs later she was crowned
the first female GG champion in the tournament's 68-year history. "It was the
best moment of my life," she said. "Those Gloves were validation." When the promoters kept calling, Matthews began punching for pay. Her brief career
illustrates the problems of the fledgling women's game. In that regard, she's
much more a symbol than Martin or Rijker. For starters, there are few competitive women at
Matthews's weight. "In nine fights, I've fought the same opponent three
times," she said, "and I've never been able to spar with a woman my weight.
That tells you something." Moreover, despite her status as a relative novice, she
managed to win a world title in her eighth pro fight. "Compared to the men, yeah, the
level is poor," Matthews said. "But it's the inexperience factor, not gender." If male fighters need balls, Matthews is loaded with the female equivalent. (We'll
call it chutzpah.) In June '95, she turned pro and was stopped on cuts in the second
round by Zamarron. Hey, Henry Armstrong was KO'd in his pro debut, too. "I said
to myself, I don't want to quit on one fight, one loss," Matthews told The
Village Voice. "I want to give it one more shot to see if it was a bad day or I
really suck." Clearly, her motivation wasn't financial. After expenses, she made about $15. Her return came 17 months later, and she scored consecutive first-round KOs before
travelling to Denmark and losing on points to someone named Sengul Ozokzu. In '98
came two more bouts with Zamarron, the first a draw and the second a decision victory for
which she was double-belted. "I like to get hit and show I can take it," Matthews said. "In one of
the Zamarron fights, I got hit and was on Queer Street. I shook my head and went back to
my corner. The people thought that was it, but it wasn't it. I think I have a
reckless personality. That's a bad philosophy [for boxing], but I have no fear of
getting hurt. My only fear is looking bad." Maybe that's why Matthews is somewhat reluctant to face the toughest fighter in
her 108-pound weight class, San Diego's Joline Blackshear. "I honestly think she
can kick my ass," said Matthews. "She's the only woman in boxing I can say
I'm scared of. I'd fight her, though." Right now, Matthews isn't
fighting anyone. As we went to press, there were a couple of possibilities in March -
without television. With great reluctance, The Zion Lion has begun accepting the cold reality of life in
the jungle. "If I don't have another fight in my life, it's been an
amazing, amazing experience," she said. "I don't want to be pathetic, but I
can handle disappointments - wouldas and couldas. I feel I've gotten more out of
boxing than men who put their lives into it." "Wait a minute," I said,
sounding like a corny Hollywood talent agent. "You do realise, don't you, that
the way you fight, the way you look, the way you talk, you could become a star?"
"I don't understand why," she answered, "if I'm so enthusiastic, I
can't get a fight." As Matthews said goodbye, turning off Fifth Avenue and toward the subway, the most
feminine homosexual male trapped in a woman's body I've ever known told me
she'd be spending the rest of the day cutting hair. A sex-change operation seems out
of the question, so the best she can hope for is therapy. And you don't need Mike
Tyson's battery of psychologists to realise the best therapy for her would be the
chance to kick some female butt. Don't you think? |
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