The history
of prize fighting is one that is replete with unending controversy. Were Jack
Dempsey's gloves loaded with 'Plaster of Paris' during his world heavyweight
title-winning bout against Jess Willard in 1919? Would Gene Tunney have beaten
the count had Jack Dempsey not delayed in proceeding to a neutral corner during
their world championship rematch in 1927? Did Jack Johnson, the first black
world heavyweight champion, feign being knocked out by Jess Willard under the
broiling Havana sun in 1915? And was Charles 'Sonny' Liston ordered to take a
dive in his rematch with Muhammad Ali in 1965?
The latter
two examples concern the more lurid-based sort of controversy, namely that of
match-fixing: the dishonest predetermination of the result of a sporting event.
Boxing is of
course not the only sport to have been subjected to rumours of fixes, many of
which culminated in scrutiny by administrative and law enforcement officials.
The most famous fix in history is arguably that of the 'Black Sox Scandal'; the
1919 Baseball World Series during which eight members of the Chicago White Sox
were accused of intentionally losing games to the Cincinnati Reds. Association
Football has intermittently had its share of match fixing scandals as indeed
has the gentleman's sport of cricket.
Sports are
result based activities which garner the interest of betting syndicates, and it
is the area of gambling which has often formed the subtext of match-fixing
allegations. Yet, in the popular imagination boxing, with its famous associations
with organised criminals, has seemingly always carried a reputation for this
particular form of underhandedness.
The story of
corruption and the stage-managing of fights memorably received both literary
and Hollywood treatment in Budd Schulberg's iconic work The Harder They Fall, the story of Toro Molina, an Argentinian
farmer and former circus performer of limited pugilistic skill who rises to the
heavyweight championship by illicit means. Using the life story of the Italian
heavyweight Primo Carnera as its template, Schulberg laid bare the mechanics of
skulduggery and human exploitation as practised by the bosses of organised
crime aided by their lackeys in the industry including promoters and pressmen.
Many of the
allegations of match-fixing in boxing remain bones of contention. Plagued by
rumour and innuendo, they calcify over the years assuredly defying resolution
in the manner of the proverbial riddle wrapped inside of an enigma.
Why they
remain this way is not necessarily hard to fathom. If it is true to say that
underworld figures frequently form the backdrop to such endeavours, then the
threat of homicidal retribution for not carrying out the prefigured result or
of blurting out the truth looms over the conspirators like a Sword of Damocles.
There are
also the matters of legitimacy and reputation. While it may be argued that
uncovering the occurrence of match-fixing may provide the basis of a
re-validation of the sport in so far as its rigorous adherence to the ethics of
probity and fair-play is concerned, the opposite just as surely applies. For
confirmation of such a scandal would tend to provide the basis of an
affirmation of the underhandedness for which the sport is often accused of
being mired in; this alongside the frequent accostment of the inherent
depravity of a sport that is predicated on inter-human violence.
The sport of
course has it heroes and and one needs to be mindful of this in so far as
scrutinizing match-fixing allegations pertaining to its prominent figures.
There may be an element of denial especially where such allegations concern the
succession to a title. Proof of match-fixing may thus have the wrenching effect
of delegitimizing both sport and lauded practitioner.
The world
light heavyweight championship bout fought between Georges Carpentier and
Battling Siki in September of 1922 provides one such example of a typically
hotly debated instance of match-fixing. But it comes with a twist of its own.
While most aficionados and historians of the sport do not doubt that the
eventual outcome -a victory by Siki- was not fixed, there is disagreement as to
whether the fight was made on the basis of a fix; an arrangement from which one
of the participants, the challenger Battling Siki, allegedly reneged.
George
Carpentier, the reigning world champion was a French idol. A handsome, urbane
figure who had served with distinction as an aviator during the First World
War, he was the recipient of the Croix De Guerre and the Medaille Militaire. He
had unsuccessfully challenged heavyweight champion Jack Dempsey the previous
year in boxing's first million dollar gate.
Siki on the
other hand was an African immigrant from the French colony of Senegal. Born in
the port city of Saint-Louis, he had come to France as the charge of a French
woman who later abandoned him. He took up boxing and fought at venues in
locations such as Marseille and Toulouse before the start of the Great War.
During the war, he served in the French military and was present at various
theatres including Gallipoli. Like Carpentier he also received the Croix De
Guerre and the Medaille Militaire.
There the
similarities between both men ended. Where Carpentier was the Gallic hero; an
amiable and civil gentleman able to effortlessly transcend the brutal nature of
his trade, Siki was often portrayed in stereotypically animalistic terms. His
manager Charles Hellers once remarked that Siki was "a scientific
ape"; adding, "Just imagine an ape that has learned to box and you
have Battling Siki."
The bare
details of the purported fix were as follows: Siki would be dropped once each
in the first and second round before Carpentier finished him off in the fourth.
In consideration for throwing the bout, Siki would receive Carpentier's purse
of 200,000 Francs. Siki assented to the terms of the agreement on the condition
that he would not get hurt.
The fight was
scheduled for twenty rounds. In the inaugural round Siki temporarily dropped to
his knee after a right hand thrown by Carpentier appeared to graze him.
In the third,
Carpentier threw a powerful blow with his right and dropped Siki. Siki was
quick in getting up and in the sudden rush towards his opponent, Carpentier
slipped from the momentum of throwing two left hooks, although he quickly
recovered his stance.
Carpentier
continually measured his man with his left and unleashed a set of combination
punches which caused Siki to lose control of his footing, bending at the knees
although not descending to the canvas. Carpentier then chased after Siki until
with the Senegalese trapped on the ropes, he unleashed a right hand which put
Siki down.
Siki remained
on one knee as the referee Henri Bernstein administered a count, but got up to
exchange blows with Carpentier until both men fell into a clinch. After this,
Siki began to show a willingness to come forward and pressure Carpentier. He
unleashed a combination on Carpentier who sank to the canvas while Siki stood
glaring at him before Bernstein pushed him back.
The fight
resumed with each fighter seemingly wishing to tear the other's head off his
shoulders: Siki with an array of short, brutish upper cuts, and Carpentier with
a series of desperate right crosses. The round ended with Carpentier trudging
back to his corner in a visibly bloodied state. It is claimed that he informed
his seconds that he had broken the knuckles of his right hand.
The fourth
began with Siki moving menacingly and determinedly towards Carpentier who
willingly gave ground. Siki bullied him for some time before Carpentier
unleashed a fusillade of punches in a desperate bid to end the bout. It failed,
and Siki came back strongly against the champion who seemed as if he could
barely stand at the end of the round.
Siki
continued to dominate in the next round while Carpentier waned. Frustrated at
the punishment he was receiving from Siki, Carpentier resorted to hurling
racial epithets at his African opponent. At one point, he charged at Siki,
head-butting his opponent to the canvas. Siki's protests came to nothing.
Carpentier tried butting Siki while both were in a clinch and soon after
charged him into a corner where Carpentier lost his footing. Siki's gesture of
helping the champion back to his feet was rewarded with a swiftly delivered
left hook to his unprotected face. The round ended with Siki complaining and
walking towards Carpentier before his handlers dragged him back to his corner
stool.
Siki pounced
at Carpentier once the bell sounded for the sixth. He hit him with a series of
hooks and uppercuts until he spun the bedraggled champion around. As he did
this, Siki's left leg appeared to leave the ground, and whether by design or
caused by the momentum, he apparently connected with either Carpentier's
mid-section or his shin. Either way, Carpentier sunk to the canvas with his
left leg perched on the lower ring rope. Bloodied and exhausted, his nose was
broken and his right eye swollen shut.
Bernstein,
who did not bother to issue a count, was quick to rule Carpentier the winner by
way of Siki's disqualification. The crowd, outraged at this denouement, began
to jeer, chanting "Siki is the winner" and "FIX! FIX!"
Within the hour, the decision would be reversed and Battling Siki had succeeded
in becoming the first African to win a world boxing title.
The question
of a 'fix' dogged the fight from the moment Henri Bernstein had disqualified
Siki and the reversal of the decision in Siki's favour did little to quell
them. It had certainly been a strange fight. Rumours continued to bubble to the
surface until Siki himself blew things into the open.
It happened
after the federation declared Siki's title as forfeited after an incident which
occurred during a bout in which Siki himself had worked as a second in the
corner of another fighter. Siki is said to have entered the ring and struck the
manager of the boxer his fighter was opposing. Siki made his complaint with the
assistance of Blaise Diagne, the representative of Senegal in the French
Chamber of Deputies.
It is useful
to note that the modus operandi of a fixed-fight may take several forms. Crucially,
both fighters do not have to be aware of the fix. For instance, James Napoli, a
prominent figure of New York's Genovese family whose operations in illegal
gambling intersected with his interests in the field of boxing had a particular
technique centering on the compromising of ring officials.
'Jimmy Nap'
would sort things out with a match official or two who needed relief from a
gambling debt or who just needed an additional injection of cash. The thinking
behind this was to favour an underdog who would be in a good position to get a
win on points so long as he remained standing at the end of the bout. This was
precisely the method used when Paddy DeMarco, a seven-to-one betting underdog,
dethroned the lightweight champion Jimmy Carter by a surprise decision in 1954.
Napoli was
also involved in another alleged fix in the 1969 world light heavyweight title
bout between Bob Foster and Frankie DePaula. Federal Bureau of Investigation
wiretaps suggested that DePaula had deliberately lost in the first round in
order to secure a betting coup.
Perhaps the
most famous dive was that taken by 'The Raging Bull', Jake LaMotta in a bout
with Billy Fox who was under the charge of both Frankie Carbo and 'Blinky'
Parlemo, the mafia figures who controlled boxing in the 1940s. LaMotta had been
compelled to take this action in order to secure a challenge for the world
middleweight championship.
In this case,
Siki had reported that the conspirators in the endeavour were Georges
Carpentier, Francois Descamps who was Carpentier's manager and Hellers. Referee
Bernstein was also said to have been involved. Siki was alleging that both he
and Carpentier had with the connivance of their managers effectively played a
pantomime for a while.
An
investigation conducted by a committee set up by the French Boxing Federation
declared in January 1923 that it was "absolutely convinced that the match
on September 24 (1922) was not preceded by an understanding the object of which
was to arrange the events of the match and fix the result."
The
federation based its findings on what it considered to be the discredited talk
by a boxer named Georges Gaillard who later denied making them during his
testimony. The committee also put a great deal of weight on the decision of
Siki not to testify before it. The decision was, it announced, underscored by
the use of deaf mute lip-reading experts who reported nothing incriminating in
the words spoken by Descamps and Hellers which were captured on film of the
bout.
Nonetheless,
there are those who challenge the findings of the federation as a whitewash
intended to preserve the reputation of the sport and some very important names
in French boxing. The most compelling evidence of an intended fix which in the
end did not materialise comes from Siki himself.
Siki's
accusations were detailed and remained unchanged. He proclaimed the intended
fix in the offices of the newspaper L'Auto
while Heller was present. Heller, he admitted, had declared him capable of
taking Carpentier only when others around. It was different when they were
alone. He emphatically told him: "You told me to take a dive."
I avenge
myself. They disqualified me by inventing lies. They deprived me of my living.
I have a wife, I have a kid and me. I was too good to the French, and it is the
French who have attacked me. I avenge myself, but I don't want to (do it)
against you Hellers, and if they hadn't attacked me, I would have kept your
secret.
Siki is then
said to have gone on to recapitulate his allegations which his manager did not
contradict but only argued over certain details.
The Italian Gazetta dello Sport purported to correct
early impressions given in French newspapers of a fix in Siki's favour to that
of a fix which had Carpentier scheduled to win by a knockout before Siki had
abandoned the ruse. One manager and two trainers who frequented La Chop du Negre, a cafe favoured by the
boxing crowd visited the offices of L'Echo
des Sports to report on the proof they had of a fix but backtracked when
called before the federation's inquiry.
For his part,
Georges Carpentier flatly denied involvement in any enterprise to have the
fight fixed. The investigating committee reported him as saying, "I never
in my life faked a fight nor prolonged one for the sake of the moving
pictures."
Part of the
resistance to accepting the idea of an intended fix lies in the image of
Carpentier as an upright gentleman soldier and pugilist. His image as a war
hero had been sold to the American public by the promoter Tex Rickard, as a
contrast to the 'draft dodger' reputation of heavyweight champion Jack Dempsey.
The idol of
France was in the public estimation beyond reproach. Nonetheless, it is worth
noting that as co-promoter of the bout and the part owner of the Velodrome, he
could afford to dispense with the winner's fee of 200,000 Francs in return for
an easy workout against a dangerous opponent. Siki's story had Hellers
conveying Descamps' deal as having Carpentier contenting himself with Siki's
officially proposed share as well as with the receipt of newsreel royalties.
If, as has frequently been believed, Carpentier failed to train properly for
his bout with Siki, could the reason for this have been related not to
overconfidence in his ability to take care of Siki, but to laxity on his part
so far as the assurance that Siki would engage in a staged exercise?
When thirty
years after Carpentier uttered the following words, it is unclear whether his
bitterness emanated from a miscalculation of Siki based on his overconfidence
or in Siki's 'betrayal' of the agreed course of action.
I've been
beaten by Siki. I, Carpentier, have let myself be beaten by this nigger I could
have stretched out at my feet....after one or two minutes of combat.
It is also
worth emphasizing the damage to the name of Carpentier as well as to French
boxing if Siki's version of events were accepted. Those who have watched the
movie Paths of Glory a fictionalised
account of a real incident during the First World War dealing with how the
French High Command sacrificed soldiers in order to protect the reputation of
the French army will appreciate the raison detre for such a cover up much in
the manner that students of history know of the true story of Alfred Dreyfus,
the Jewish army captain whose innocence of espionage was known to the authorities
but regardless was allowed to rot in detention for years.
As with
Dreyfus, it was not only a matter of preserving the honour of a French
institution, but it was a question of not allowing a 'racial inferior' to
expose corruption.
If Carpentier
was attempting to protect his good image in a situation involving more than a
whiff of scandalous behaviour it would not be the last. During the Second World
War while the northern part of France was under Nazi occupation, Carpentier was
involved with running a tavern alongside a known French collaborator. Situated
opposite the grave of the 'Unknown French Soldier', the establishment was
popular among the German interlopers.
Carpentier's
close associations with the occupiers did not make for good relations with the
French resistance. In March of 1944, the Germans sponsored Carpentier's 50th
birthday celebration with a special boxing exhibition. Later that year, an
American press report referred to him as a "Nazi chattel".
There was
perhaps something of an Albert Speer about him. After the war, Carpentier's
denials of pro-German activities were effective enough to at least spare him
the fate meted out to collaborators. His service during the First World War had
likely played a part in this outcome.
But if he has
largely escaped the taint of match-fixing allegations with Siki, the stench of
being a pro-Nazi collaborator remained. Seven years after his death in 1975,
Gerard Oury's film L'as des As was an
obvious attempt at salvaging Carpentier's reputation. The heavily fictionalised
account of Carpentier's life via an anti-Nazi protagonist named 'Georges
Chevalier' played by the former amateur boxer turned film star Jean Paul
Belmondo can be viewed as an attempt to sanitize a legacy tainted by evidence
of collaboration with the occupying Nazis during the Second World War.
And of Siki?
His career went downhill after his victory over Carpentier. Siki suffered for
blurting out the attempted fix by effectively forfeiting his ability to earn a
living fighting in France and the rest of Western Europe. He was banned from
fighting in Britain by the Home Secretary Winston Churchill who based the
decision on the potentially unsettling effect interracial contests could have
on public order across the British empire.
After losing
his world title to Mike McTigue in Ireland, Siki travelled to the United States
where he lost to the light heavyweights Kid Norfolk and Paul Berlenbach. His
life spiraled out of control with alcohol abuse and confrontations with the police.
He was found shot to death in the Hell's Kitchen area of New York in December
of 1925.
Siki's
reputation suffered in death as it had in life. But the lopsided view of Siki
as a 'child of the jungle' maladjusted to the pressures of living in a 'civilised'
environment is changing. He has been the subject of a number of books in recent
years where his life and boxing career have been subject to a higher standard
of research and analysis.
The
exaggerated stories as well as the myths which for so long had been the staple
of boxing wordsmiths have been corrected. For all his faults, Siki was a
sensitive human being who contested the dehumanizing effects of racism in
society. Unfailingly resplendent in his choice of attire, he was a cultured man
who spoke a number of languages including French, Dutch and English.
His life
journey has even provided the inspiration for a jazz suite.
As a fighter,
Siki will never be ranked among the great fighters in so far as technique and
longevity are concerned. But while there is much to agree with the supposition
that he was lucky to defeat a champion who was past his prime, there is also
much evidence that he was mismanaged and his potential not maximized.
While
Carpentier, a respected ring technician, ranks higher in the esteem of boxing
historians for his accomplishments both as a middleweight and light
heavyweight, there may be a tendency to diminish Siki's victory on the grounds
that Carpentier was ageing and physically unprepared.
Carpentier
had, after all, not yet reached his thirtieth birthday. His physical
appearance, that of a lithe and well-proportioned boxer which was familiar to
boxing audiences, betrayed no evidence of excess fat in his abdominal area.
Moreover, he would go on to knock out Marcel Nilles the following year; a
fighter against whom Siki had only been able to win on points. 'Styles make
fights' goes an often used phrase in boxing and it is possible that Carpentier
was unable to deal with the problems caused by Siki's 'awkward' approach in the
ring. This includes the idea of combating Siki by fighting him 'inside'and
hammering away as suggested by Jack Dempsey. Siki was able to effectively close
the gap when Carpentier measured him with his left and he also hurt Carpentier
when they locked horns 'inside'.
Any summation
of Siki and Carpentier cannot fail to grasp the manner in which each man
transcended the confines of the squared ring. Where Carpentier was a national
icon of France, Siki was adopted by the likes of Ho Chi Minh as a symbol of the
struggle against colonialism. Each man was a decorated war hero who achieved a
series of 'firsts' in boxing.
It would be a
remarkable feat for any fighter to have negotiated a career in the boxing world
at the time they were active without having to compromise on what would be
considered to as sound ethical standards. Whatever is the truth behind the
mystery of the Velodrome, it should be clear that in the final analysis
Battling Siki was no more the devil than Georges Carpentier was a saint.
(c) Adeyinka
Makinde (2016)
Adeyinka
Makinde is the author of the books DICK
TIGER: The Life and Times of a Boxing Immortal (2005) and JERSEY BOY: The Life and Mob Slaying of
Frankie DePaula (2010)
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