Know Your Latino Boxing Legends: Carlos Palomino
"It's not whether you win or lose, its how you play the game". That's one of the oldest chestnuts in the Encyclopedia of Sports Clichés, but for the mainstream sports media, and the fans that depend on them for their information, it's just not true. It's all about whether you win or lose. Turn on any sports talk radio show and you'll be subjected to all manner of banal discussion to reinforce my point. Karl Malone and Dan Marino weren't truly great because they never won a championship. The Utah Jazz and Buffalo Bills weren't great teams because they were unable to take their sport's ultimate honor. If teams and players aren't being berated for a failure to win, they're simply forgotten. If you can name the losing team in the past ten NBA championships you've got a much better knowledge of sports trivia than do I. Yet it is the frequently maligned (by the mainstream sports media at least) sport of boxing that most often lives by the "how you play the game" mantra. Serious boxing fans talk more about great fights than in terms of who wins or loses. The greatness of fights like the Ward-Gatti trilogy, the Barrera-Morales trilogy, Hagler-Hearns, Hagler-Leonard and, most recently, the Morales-Pacqiuao classic from March 2005 are almost exclusively about how the "game was played". Most of these fights were very closely contested, but even in the event of a decisive victory like Hagler-Hearns much credit is given to the opponent for making the fight great. Perhaps the best recent case in point is the fight between Manny Pacquaio and Juan Manuel Marquez, which was at or near the top of most serious boxing journalists' "fight of the year" list. Despite the fight's wall to wall action, the official decision was a draw.
In that context, an undefeated record for a veteran fighter is almost a mark of derision. After a fighter has a dozen fights or so under his belt, an undefeated record is often construed as a reflection of a poor quality of opposition and not a sign of dominance. There are exceptions, of course: Floyd Mayweather, Jr. has a “zero” in the loss column and that’s due to his ungodly skills as a prize fighter. Assuming that Mayweather doesn’t stay in the game longer than he should, he’s got a decent shot at retiring undefeated. Nevertheless, simply being undefeated won’t earn him the mantle of greatness in the eyes of boxing historians. That has to be earned in the ring.
And that brings us to the inaugural entry in our new series “Know Your Latino Boxing Legends”, where we feature a fighter that had 4 losses during his illustrious career. A native of Sonora, Mexico, Carlos Palomino was the welterweight champion of the world for over two years during the mid to late 70’s. During this time, he became the first world champion boxer to earn a college degree (from Long Beach State University in California).
Palomino came to the United States when he was ten and, like many Mexican immigrants, started to train as a boxer during his teenage years. He displayed a good deal of skill at an early age, but delayed becoming a professional until after a 2 year stint in the Army where he was the All-Army Welterweight Champion. He also won the national AAU championship in 1972 before turning pro later that year. He was brought along slowly and steadily (despite a decision loss to Andy Price in 1974. By the middle of the decade he had put himself into championship contention and finally won the title in June 1976. Palomino scored a TKO victory over Englishman John Stracey in a very hostile environment (London, England) and became the WBC Welterweight Champion. He defended his title seven times over the next two years, before dropping the belt to a hall of fame level opponent in Wilfred Benitez in a split decision (January 1979). He lost his next bout to another hall of fame fighter in Roberto Duran and decided to hang up his gloves. He made a short comeback in the late 1990’s, posting a 4-1 record before retiring for good.
Palomino turned his attention to acting following his boxing career, and has worked steadily in a variety of roles both in movies (mostly forgettable action films) and television (shows like “Taxi”, “Star Trek Voyager”, “Highway to Heaven” and “Hill Street Blues”). He appeared in some of the early Miller Light “tastes great/less filling” TV commercials. He’s also done some live theatre work, in addition to generating publicity for a number of charities.
In the ring, Palomino was something of a hybrid of Marco Antonio Barrera and Erik Morales—a very intelligent, technically sound fighter with deceptive power. His best power shot was a left hook, but he’d more frequently break his opponent down with a punishing body attack. He may have been a more tactical competitor than the prototypical “blood and guts” Mexican fighter, but a worthy claimant to the proud tradition of great fighters from south of the border.
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