Boxing is the most honest of sports. The boxer, unlike the normal person, steps into the ring and willingly accepts that he’ll be punched in the face. Anyone can throw a punch at a heavy bag, but you’re not a boxer until you’ve eaten some punches and nodded like a demented little freak at the guy trying to take you out. Years ago, in the heat of my boxing fandom, I had my dad buy me a pair of gloves and I proceeded to throw jabs and hooks and uppercuts into the air. The great Mexican fighter, Julio César Chávez, was one of my heroes, and, so, for a brief interlude in the burgeoning days of my adolescent baseball career, I thought that I’d give boxing a go. I was already a jock, after all, so the transition would be easy. I was a tough kid, too. I’d watched hundreds of bouts alongside my dad, so, like a typical young man, I thought: I can do that. I can throw a punch. I can bob and weave and bounce off the ropes and attack my opponents with body shots and keep coming. I can surely take a punch.
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