Men’s Modern
Gennadiy “GGG” Golovkin, the Kazakhstan-born champion, competed for 16 years from 2006 to 2022. He was the king of the middleweights for years, holding the WBA, WBC, IBF, and IBO titles. He faced a long list of elite fighters, including Danny Jacobs, Saul Alvarez, and Kell Brook, among others.
Antonio Tarver – Florida’s Tarver, a 1996 Olympian, competed for 18 years, racking up the WBA (Unified), WBC, IBF, and Ring magazine 175-pound titles. He also won the IBO light heavyweight and cruiserweight titles. Tarver holds wins over legend Roy Jones and faced a long list of the best of his time, including Glen Johnson, Bernard Hopkins, Montell Griffin, and others.
Nigel Benn – England’s Benn, whose son Connor is currently a top contender, was a 2-weight world champion holding the WBO middleweight and WBC super-middle titles. A hugely popular fighter in Britain, he faced Steve Collins, Gerald McClellan, and Chris Eubanks, among others.
Women’s Modern
Naoko Fujioka – is Japan’s first 5-division champion. Fujioko held the WBC minimumweight, WBO junior-flyweight, WBA flyweight and super-flyweight, and WBO bantamweight (female) titles. She accomplished all this in a 13-year, 23-fight career.
Jackie Nava – Mexico’s Nava is a former 2-weight champion holding the WBA bantamweight and WBC super bantamweight (female) titles. She also held the WBA super bantamweight title twice. Nava hasn’t just had success in her 40-4-4 boxing career – in 2003, Nava earned an undergraduate degree in architecture from the Tijuana Institute of Technology.
Non-Participant/Contributors
Russ Anber – Montreal, Canada’s Anber, a half-century legend in Canadian boxing, has been a trainer, cut man, expert hand wrapper, and broadcaster in his storied career. He has also guided and built Rival Boxing Equipment into the industry’s leading boxing equipment manufacturer. Anber still works with the same passion, pride, and enthusiasm that he did when he started out as an 18-year-old in the sport. A Canadian-born and based, but globally recognized, boxing legend indeed!
Dr. Edwin “Flip” Homansky, the retired Las Vegas doctor, has overseen some of the biggest fights in boxing with some of the biggest fighters in the sport over decades in Nevada. Highly respected for his passion and commitment to respecting, while protecting, the fighters in boxing. Georgia-born Homansky has been a 3-decade medical mainstay in Las Vegas Boxing.
Posthumus
Jimmy Glenn – Glenn was the man behind the bar at “Jimmy’s Corner” in Manhattan for decades. Perhaps boxing’s most famous watering hole, the walls were adorned with classic fight photographs. The South Carolina-born, former boxer and cornerman went on to become a trainer, manager, and cut man. He worked with heavyweight great Floyd Patterson. He also operated the Times Square Gym for 18 years. A Big Apple boxing legend indeed.
Frank Cappuccino – Philadelphia native Cappuccino boxed as an amateur lightweight in the 1940s and had a 3-fight pro career in 1949. He then turned to officiating in the late 1950s and served as a referee and judge for decades in both club shows, along with some of the biggest fights in the sport. Highly respected, he loved boxing as much as the sport loved him.
Observers
Kevin Iole – A Pittsburgh native and award-winning sports journalist. Over a 46-year career, Iole was a former senior columnist for Yahoo Sports and a writer for the Las Vegas Review-Journal. He is a Nat Fleischer Award winner for career excellence in boxing journalism. Iolon covered some of boxing’s biggest events, featuring many legends in the sport.
Alex Wallau – Wallau began his career with ABC Sports in the mid-70s. He was a 2-time Emmy Award-winning producer and director of ABC’s sports, working primarily on ABC’s boxing with announcing legend Howard Cosell. By the mid-80s, Wallau was ABC’s boxing analyst. In the late 80s, Wallau was diagnosed with stage 4 throat cancer. After multiple treatments and surgeries, Wallau would eventually go back on the air and live until this past October, 38 years after his near-fatal diagnosis. Close friend, announcer Al Michaels said, “He is the strongest guy I’ve ever met in my life. The way he has handled this is beyond comprehension. There aren’t words to describe it. His battle from day one has been unwavering. He has never allowed himself to feel bad or to feel sorry for himself.”
Alex Wallau, in the toughest of fights against the toughest of opponents, was a champion indeed!
Old Timer
Jimmy Clabby – Sadly, only lived to the age of 44, but did win the Australian welterweight championship in his career and the world middleweight title. He turned pro in 1906 and 17 years later had logged a record of 81-21-23 (46 KOs). In 1910, he won the world welterweight title (Australian version), in 1915, he won the world middleweight title in New York, and 5 months later, he lost a 15-round UD in a bid for the Australian middleweight title.