Howard Edward Davis, Jr. was an American amateur and professional boxer….who grew up on Long Island as the eldest of 10 children….learning boxing from his father. After being inspired by a movie about Muhammad Ali….Davis embarked on his amateur career. He won the 1976 Olympic gold medal one week after his mother died…..being awarded the Val Barker Trophy at the Olympics….beating out such boxers as Sugar Ray Leonard, Michael Spinks and Leon Spinks.
He turned professional after the Olympics and went on to compile a professional record of 36–6–1 with 14 knockouts. He retired in 1996….and after retirement he became a trainer. Eventually he worked as boxing director at American Top Team in Coconut Creek, Florida….where he trained both amateur and professional boxers and MMA fighters. He was also a motivational speaker and a musician.
Héctor Luís Camacho Matías nicknamed Macho Camacho….was a Puerto Rican professional boxer and singer. Known for his quickness in the ring and flamboyant style….he held major championships in the WBC super featherweight (1983)….WBC lightweight (1985)….and WBO junior welterweight (1989 and 1991) divisions. After earning minor titles in four additional weight classes….Camacho became the first boxer to be recognized as a septuple champion.….and one of the reasons he was a super great boxer during the golden age of boxing.
A storied amateur, Camacho won three New York Golden Gloves, beginning with the Sub-Novice 112 lb. championship in 1978….being loved as the home town boy at Madison Square Garden. During his 30-year career, Camacho had many notable fights….defeating Panama’s Roberto Durán twice late in Duran’s career….and knocking out a 40-year-old Sugar Ray Leonard, sending Leonard into permanent retirement. He also fought against Julio César Chávez, Félix Trinidad, and Oscar de la Hoya, among others.
During his later years, Camacho expanded his popular role and appeared on a variety of Spanish-language reality television shows including Univision’s’ dancing show Mira Quien Baila and a weekly segment on the popular show El Gordo y La Flaca named Macho News. But, he also had trouble with drug abuse and criminal charges. In 2005 he was arrested for burglary, a charge to which he would later plead guilty. In 2008, he won his last major fight, the World Boxing Empire middleweight championship. In 2011, he was shot at three times by would-be carjackers in San Juan….but was uninjured. In the fall of 2012, Camacho was shot and seriously wounded while sitting in a car outside a bar in his native Bayamón, Puerto Rico….as the driver, a childhood friend, was killed in the shooting. Camacho died four days later; after he was declared clinically brain dead, his mother requested the doctors remove him from life support.
Regardless of his troubles in the latter years of his life…..during his years in the ring…..he was one of this lil ole Chiweenie Sportsphile’s favorite boxers….cuz it is still today very hard for me to believe that this cute lil choir boy with the spit-curl could be so ferocious and mean in the ring.
