by Richard Cohen
ecently fight
promoter Don King was given the NAACP's prestigious President's Award for
being either a great donor or a great man. "He is and continues to
be vilified by those who don't want him to succeed," NAACP president
Kweisi Mfume said of the presumably misunderstood and oft-victimized King.
Mfume had just had a firsthand chance to appreciate King's greatness since
he had been at the Mike Tyson-Evander Holyfield fight, which King had promoted
on behalf of (1) himself and (2) the Chomper.
The uncanny ability of charitable organizations to discern wonderful, but hidden, qualities in rich people is by now well-documented. Since King has given of his purse to many organizations, including the Congressional Black Caucus, the United Negro College Fund, TransAfrica, and ($75,000 in 1988) to the Don King Center for Black-Jewish Relations, many awards will no doubt follow.
But the one the other day from the NAACP ought to get an award of its own. For in citing King as a racial pioneer in boxing -- a triumph of sorts -- Mfume plunged from the merely mercenary to the sordid in the span of a single sentence: "We appreciate his work as we did the work of Jackie Robinson 50 years ago."
However, the great Brooklyn Dodger second baseman did not, as King did, stomp a man to death in 1967 over a gambling debt. The victim was one Sam Garrett, a slightly built petty gambler. King himself was then in the numbers racket and served one month shy of four years for what was, for some reason, deemed a mere manslaughter.
These facts come to us via King's unwanted biographer, the New York Post's Jack Newfield, whose 1995 book, Only In America: The Life and Times of Don King, also reports that in 1984 King took $1 million from the promotional rights for a fight in South Africa -- breaking the anti-apartheid boycott then in place. Newfield also says that King "shortchanged" Muhammad Ali and has promoted fights that were, to put it mildly, shams. One of the two fighters, it turned out, could not fight.
Only saints are saints, and Robinson was not one. He was a man, and therefore flawed. But he was honest and industrious, disciplined and well-mannered, and possessed of a racial pride that would not permit him to take shortcuts. No one ever accused him of cheating -- not even on the base paths -- and he would not, as King has repeatedly done, smother serious charges of impropriety by yelling racism.
In one lamentable sense, Mfume is right: King does represent progress. The old white mobsters who once controlled boxing -- the late Frankie Carbo comes to mind -- have had to make accommodations with the likes of Don King. This is only fair and, as any sociologist will tell you, very American. The Irish, the Jews, the Italians -- they and others have all had their turn.
As for the NAACP, it has had its own turn, too. The festooning of King represents a return to boxing for that organization. Traditionally, it viewed boxing, especially the heavyweight division, as its own bailiwick. It sought role models, and so it extolled Floyd Patterson, a good man but not a great fighter, and eschewed Ali, a Muslim and Vietnam War resister. Now, though, it has embraced just the sort of fellow it once wanted to shun. Standards have fallen.
Anyone who does any reading at all about King is bound to come upon acclaim for his smarts -- even his brilliance. He is, beyond doubt, a master showman and a formidable businessman. But to compare him -- checkered past, checkered present, and that awful Tyson fight -- with Jackie Robinson does not really honor King nor, emphatically, does it diminish the great Robinson. It merely shows how greedy the NAACP is for a buck. King would understood. It took a dive.