Böcker av Tris Dixon

A trip across America to track down the great fighters from yesteryear who vanished from the limelight, and hear their incredible storiesIn the era of boxing's pay-per-view superstars, Tris Dixon invested in a Greyhound bus pass and spent several months traversing America on a shoestring budget, tracking down fighters from yesteryear who had vanished from the limelight. Venturing from New York to Las Vegas and from Toronto to Miami, the young writer--himself a former amateur boxer--sought out coulda-been-contenders and cult heroes from the 1950s to the 2000s, all now faded from popular memory. He visited old people's homes, gyms, and too many prisons, discovering that life after boxing can be a cruel place when the ropes are no longer in place to keep fighters safe from the outside world. Dixon meets men who shaped boxing history, fighting the likes of Sugar Ray Robinson, Muhammad Ali, and Mike Tyson. He shares their memories and weaves together their forgotten tales over the course of a remarkable American journey.

Matthew Saad Muhammad was arguably the most exciting fighter of all time. He was WBC light-heavyweight champion from 1979 to 1981, but it wasn''t what he did that captured the hearts of fight fans, it was how he did it. Fight after fight was war after war. He would get beaten up, cut, dropped and virtually knocked out only to astonishingly rally and score come-from-behind victories. But through it all there was a shocking backstory. Abandoned by his birth parents aged just four, Matthew was raised in a Catholic orphanage and then adopted by a Portuguese family. He fell into a life of gangs and prison before boxing provided an escape, becoming a vehicle for him to find his real identity: who was he, and who were his parents? His rise to stardom was followed by a long, sad decline as he travelled the world trying to reclaim his former glories. He spent his final years in a Philadelphia homeless shelter, plagued by health issues. This is the definitive account of Matthew''s incredible but heart-rending story.