Bernie McCoy – The first thing you notice about the NY Kidz and Fitness gym is that it’s not Gleasons. That famous boxing gym is located on Front Street in a gentrified Brooklyn neighborhood that used to be a waterfront. Kidz and Fitness is located off Wyckoff Avenue on the border of Brooklyn and Queens in a neighborhood where gentrification is still somewhere on the municipal drawing board. But there are many more boxing gyms like Kidz and Fitness in the city than there are Gleasons and there are more similarities between the two gyms than, initially, meet the eye. Boxing is the main business in both locations and boxing is the reason each establishment opens the doors. And while the roster of boxers who climb the stone stairs on Front Street is an impressive collage of male and female fighters, a young athlete who, daily, goes through the storefront entrance at Kidz and Fitness may be the best female featherweight in New York..
“I love everything about boxing,” Amanda Serrano says, as we sit at a front counter in the Kidz and Fitness gym in Ridgewood, Queens. “I love training five hours every day, the running, the lifting, the sparring; I love the smell of the gym; I love the bond that exists among the fighters; I love fans asking for autographs; I even love walking around with marks from the fights, badges of boxing honor.
It’s right here,” Serrano gestures around the gym, “that all the questions about the sport, all the questions about your next bout, about how to conduct yourself as a professional fighter, they all get answered, right here.”
You expect words like this from veteran fighters, those who’ve “been there, done that,” but you pay attention when you hear it from a twenty-one year old who has been a professional boxer for slightly less than a year and a half. You wonder if, despite all the shortcomings of the sport and those who profess to run it, that there still may be a future for Women’s boxing. And maybe there is, since there are more talented professional female boxers in the sport, now than at any time in it’s history. There are, quite simply, more quality female boxers who have learned their sport, the right way; female boxers who have risen through amateur programs and who, on turning professional, don’t set out seeking to accumulate “easy Ws” but, instead, look for bouts that will move them forward in the sport.
“I was an ‘opponent’ in my first bout,” Serrano recalls. “I went up to Albany (NY) to fight Jackie Trivilino, who had the reputation, upstate, as a very tough fighter. I guess her management thought I would be a good debut fight for her. At the weigh-in, there was a lot of “smack” about my amateur record (8-1, 2008 NY Daily News 125 lb title) and how much more difficult the pro ranks were from the amateurs. Jackie was tough, she was a great first fight for me. I got a majority decision, which I still believe should have been unanimous, but it was a perfect first bout for me. My toughest fight was Ela Nunez (November 2009) in Atlantic City. I thought I won a close bout against a very good fighter, but it came down a draw.”
That bout was Nunez’ 15th fight of her pro career, including a win over Lindsay Garbatt and TKOs of Brooke Dierdorff and Kina Malpartida, current WBA super featherweight champion. It was Amanda Serrano’s fifth pro bout. Her last fight was in June, against another up-and-coming New York featherweight, Nydia Feliciano. The three judges, that night, in Atlantic City, gave Serrano 17 of 18 rounds and Feliciano her first loss.
It was Serrano’s dominating dismantling of Feliciano that puts her, at the very least, in the discussion of the best New York female featherweights. Of course, in any discussion of that type, there’s always the “Real Million Dollar Baby.” I ask Serrano if she was contacted regarding the recent bout for the vacant NABF featherweight title. The fighter flashes a look that says she would have been a lot less surprised if she had gotten a call to replace Derek Jeter at shortstop for the New York Yankees. It’s a look that’s familiar on Wyckoof Avenue and all over the city. The one word neighborhood translation is “Fuhgeddaboutit”.
“No, I don’t think I was on any short list for Maureen Shea,” Serrano says, with a straight face. The NABF, also with what I assume was a straight face, sanctioned a bout with Shea and Liliana Martinez, an 8-10 fighter, who lacked a career win against a fighter with a winning record, a mark Martinez kept intact against Shea in Saratoga Springs, NY on July 30.
“I’m not, particularly, concerned about titles,” Serrano states, emphatically, “they’ve become irrelevant in our sport. I see someone with six title belts and I think, ‘what’s that all about.’ Is this grade school and everyone gets a star?’ There are simply too many titles out there, the belts have become meaningless. There are good competitive fights for every fighter in every weight class who wants them. Those are the bouts that should be made and the winners of those bouts, and only those bouts, should be the champions. And when we get to that point, when titles are decided by bouts between two good fighters, then we’ll have title holders that the sport can point to with pride. The way it is right now, I could care less about titles. What I want are quality bouts with good fighters, whomever is up above me in the rankings. If I can get those fights, the titles will take care of themselves. I honestly believe that it’s better to lose at something than win at nothing.”
It’s not only her talent in the ring that separates Amanda Serrano from many in her sport. This is a twenty-one year old boxer who “gets it.” She gets that her sport is about going up the ladder, not constantly looking down, for fights. She gets that each time in the ring is about reaching for the outer limits of a fighter’s talent, not about overwhelming overmatched opponents. I hope she keeps that attitude for however long she’s in the professional ring. Amanda Serrano has that attitude now and those who, ostensibly, run the sport should take notice and provide this talented female fighter with opportunities that will showcase her talent and her sport. Both will be better off.