By Josh Noel
“He drops his hands,” says Freedman. “Bad habit he’s got. Doesn’t care about gettin’ hit. Some guys feel rewarded when they get hit, they like it. He’s one of ’em. Unfortunately.”
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Feldman lived out of a hotel, where he “met some guys and some girls and partied with them.” But really he was there to see how far he could take his boxing, and the answer was not very far. “I sparred with some fighters who were extremely good,” he says, “and I didn’t stand a chance.” Maybe just as important, he realized he wasn’t cut out for the boxing life. “The quality of people there wasn’t the best. I didn’t want to associate with those low-class, animalistic kinds of guys.”
Among its staff was 31-year-old Glen Freedman, a native of Skokie who’d retired in 1990 from a career as “The Jewish Nightmare,” during which he earned a 51-18 record and twice won the city’s light heavyweight title. A few professional offers came along, but he never bit. “I wouldn’t have been much as a pro,” he says. “Boxing is a sport where the first three guys are big, and if you’re the number four guy, you’re a piece of shit.” He’d been working as a wedding DJ when a coworker told him that health clubs were looking for people like him: smart, articulate, and experienced in boxing. Health clubs? Freedman laughed, picturing himself at the head of a boxing-aerobics class of 40 people. But the coworker persisted, and eventually Freedman found himself interviewing with the East Bank Club. During the conversation he was told that the club already had one boxing trainer. “I said, ‘What’s his name?’ They said, ‘It’s not a he, it’s a she.’ I said, ‘I don’t want to make any remarks, but I’m not sure we’re talking about the same thing here.’”
The Doc’s bout is scheduled for 8:30, but I show up at 6:30. A man standing outside the bar turns out to be Bellino’s partner, Howard Frum. He’s a jeweler, the “Wanna Buy a Watch” guy who’s advertised on TV for years. “You know: ‘Wanna buy a watch?’ You know those commercials? That’s me.” Apparently people often recognize him from this explanation, but I don’t. He doesn’t seem too concerned as he offers me a plastic cigar cutter decorated with the words “Wanna Buy a Watch!!”
In 1981 a New York Times article about Wall Street boxers first gave him the idea to put guys like the Doc in the ring, but he didn’t try it for close to ten years. When he matched an orthopedic surgeon with a criminal court judge, the unlikely pairing “packed the house.” Bellino paired traders from the Mercantile Exchange with traders from the Board of Trade; people loved it. Now he’s decided that this is the way to sell boxing in Chicago: “When we get these businessmen in there, there’s a novelty to it. They’re exhausted, and it’s all they can do to swing a right hand, but the crowd loves it. It fits the modern-day attention span.”
The fight doctor examines him more thoroughly than any of the other fighters, taking his blood pressure, dragging a stethoscope across his upper torso. Freedman leans in and says quietly, “He’s looking for something wrong. If he gets hurt, it’s on him. They don’t think this is a place for a guy in his 50s.”
