The modest champion
Close friend ‘Hookie’ Thompson hails boxing legend Mike McCallum who took him to his fights abroad
WORD that Jamaican boxing legend Mike McCallum died hit his very close friend Headley “Hookie” Thompson like one of the punishing body punches that earned the champion pugilist the moniker The Body Snatcher.
“Mi almost cry,” Thompson told the Jamaica Observer as he related his reaction on receiving the news Sunday morning from a fellow journalist who worked with him for years at the now-defunct Jamaica Broadcasting Corporation (JBC).
Thompson’s silence apparently spurred his colleague to enquire about his health.
“He asked me what is wrong with me, if a faint mi a faint, and mi seh, ‘No man, but mi cyaan believe,’ ” Thompson shared.
Early reports are that 68-year-old McCallum died suddenly on Saturday in Las Vegas in the United States. He was reportedly driving to a gym when he fell ill and pulled off the road. He was found unresponsive and later pronounced dead.
The shock of McCallum’s passing was evident in Thompson’s voice as he told the Observer that he last spoke with his good friend a mere two months ago.
“He told me he has a Nigerian in his camp who he thinks is going to be a world champion,” Thompson said, adding that McCallum was training boxers in Las Vegas.
Thompson, a former producer/sport reporter at JBC who said he introduced the programmes Saturday Sports Special and Thursday Nights at the Fights, is one of few Jamaicans who accompanied McCallum to most of his fights abroad — starting with his October 1984 defeat of Irish boxer Sean Mannion at Madison Square Garden in New York. That victory gave McCallum the vacant World Boxing Association (WBA) junior middleweight title and made him the first Jamaican-born world champion.
The friendship, Thompson said, started when he first met McCallum at the national championships at Dragon Gym on Windward Road in Kingston.
“It was the best gym in Jamaica at that time, and Mike was an amateur. He and Clive Ellis were good friends and they usually made the Jamaica team to the Caribbean Championships.
“I remember Bunny Grant and Percy Hayles were the two outstanding boxers Jamaica had, but they couldn’t get any shot at a world title. I went up to Mike and said to him, ‘You are going to be the first world champion that Jamaica produces,’ and from then we became friends,” Thompson said.
“I also told him that, ‘Whenever you turn pro you can’t stay in Jamaica, you have to go abroad,’ ” Thompson shared.
He said McCallum left Jamaica for New York and each time he competed in the ring he would call and share the results. That gave Thompson content for the local sports news.
After defeating Mannion, the Jamaican boxer made six successful defences of the title, winning all by knockout. Three of them were against Julian Jackson, Milton McCrory, and Donald Currie, from August 1986 to July 1987.
Thompson remembers the Currie fight in July 1987 at Caesars Palace, Las Vegas.
“That fight was booked for prime time on ABC TV, and when him knock out Currie in the fifth round, is like if you drop pin in Las Vegas you could hear it,” Thompson said.
He also recalled the August 1986 bout against Jackson, saying that the promoters wanted Jackson to win.
“The fight was billed for ABC TV on the Friday night. We were in the dressing room talking when a man came in and said, ‘Mike McCallum, your fight is next and you cannot hold up ABC, you have to be ready.’ That time Mike never warm up yet, because is a nine o’clock fight we were expecting, but this man came in at around seven o’clock and said the fight is at 8:00,” Thompson stated.
He remembers that, in the first round, McCallum was subjected to the type of onslaught that would send lesser boxers to the canvas.
“After the first round mi seh a done the fight done. Then in the second round Mike won the fight,” Thompson said.
Boxing archives state that McCallum delivered devastating blows to Jackson’s head and body in the second round, eventually forcing the referee to stop the fight.
Following those victories, Thompson said he was with McCallum when he took on opponents in France and Italy.
“If it wasn’t for Mike I wouldn’t know these countries,” Thompson said.
Asked what the world champion was like outside the ring, Thompson said: “The man was a modest individual. He always remembered where he came from, and never made his achievements get to his head. He wouldn’t see you, as someone he know from way back, and not talk to you, and he would help if he could because he knew where he came from.”
McCallum, he recalled, was from the rugged Tower Hill community that neighbours Waterhouse in the St Andrew West Central constituency.
“The last time he came to Jamaica I got him on television,” Thompson said, adding a heavy sigh, “Only a pity that I can’t just call him and say, ‘Get better, my brother.’ ”
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