Sometimes, he’s in a word. Sometimes, he’s in a look. Sometimes, he’s in an echo, a little bit like the sound of a distant speedbag filling an empty gym with a rhythm as comforting as it is haunting. Always, he is there for Teresa Tapia.
Johnny Tapia is gone, been gone for more than seven years. But his memory, his legacy, endures a lot like he did throughout 45 years full of conflict within the ropes and within himself. He was a showman. An angry man, too. His emotions and energy were always there, genuine and abundantly evident. He was crazy and caring, all at once.
His story lives on in film, books and forever in Teresa, his widow who is back as a promoter with a legacy to guide her through a rough-and-tumble business. It’s fitting in a way. Her late husband would never have strayed far from boxing. It’s safe to say he would have always been poised for another comeback, anther improbable return from the perilous edge.
Teresa, her late husband’s manager, is making that comeback. She’s a promoter for the Impact Network, which launches its boxing programming Saturday with former junior middleweight champion Austin Trout (31-5-1, 17 KOs) also in a comeback against Mexican Rosbel Montoya (17-9-1, 13 KOs) in Ruidoso, New Mexico.
“It’s like coming home,’’ Teresa said of her return to the familiar sights and sounds of a ringside scene that hasn’t changed much since her husband died on May 27, 2012 in Albuquerque.
She had left, drifted away, for about three years not long after Johnny’s death. She ran a home-health business and raised sons Johnny Lorenzo and Johnny Nikki. But there were always moments that brought her back.
She was there in Canastota, New York in 2017, standing in her late husband’s place alongside Evander Holyfield and Marco Antonio Barrera for his induction to the International Boxing Hall of Fame almost exactly five years after his death.
She watched her sons begin to follow their dad into the ring, Johnny Lorenzo as a junior-welterweight poised to make his pro debut and the younger Johnny Nikki as an amateur.
“Johnny Lorenzo looks a little bit like his dad,’’ she said. “Acts a little bit like him, too.’’
All the while, she heard from fans of her late husband, a three-division champion – junior bantamweight, bantamweight and featherweight.
‘’It’s amazing,’’ she said. “His fans are everywhere. Australia, China.’’
The Tapia story is compelling, in part for its ever-present danger. His drug use was no secret. He served four years in prison. Yet, his resiliency in the face of a self-destructive streak was astonishing. Even miraculous.
There were repeated brushes with death. Yet he came back and resumed his career. Teresa writes about one of those moments in the latest book about her late husband, “The Ghost of Johnny Tapia” by Paul Zanon.
In a forward, she writes about rushing to the hospital after getting news from her mom that Tapia was DOA, dead-on-arrival. When she arrived at the emergency room, however, there he was, up and running down the hallway.
He was a fighter in virtually every way, a motivation for Teresa.
“I want to further his legacy,’’ said Teresa, who will be involved in promoting cards and producing television documentaries on the fighters in each of the 52 shows planned by Impact over the next two years. “I think it’s important.
“Mostly, I hope to be the kind of promoter Johnny would want me to be. He was for the fighters. Always for the fighters.’’
Follow Norm Frauenheim on Twitter at @FrauenheimNorm
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