The Art of Manliness - #524： Boxing Trainer Teddy Atlas on What It Means to Be a Man

00:00:00.000 brett mckay here and welcome to another edition of the art of manliness podcast teddy atlas was

00:00:12.160 born to a well-respected doctor in a wealthy part of staten island most kids like him end up going

00:00:16.640 to an ivy league school to become some sort of white collar professional teddy well teddy dropped

00:00:20.720 out of high school went to jail ended up becoming a trainer to 18 world champion boxers including

00:00:25.440 heavyweight champion michael moorer who defeated evander holyfield for the title in 1994 today on

00:00:30.420 the show i talked to teddy about how and why he took the path he did in life teddy explains how he

00:00:34.340 ended up boxing under legendary trainer custom motto and how cuss guided teddy towards becoming a trainer

00:00:38.940 himself teddy then shares stories of training kids in the cat skills taking them to unsanxed amateur

00:00:43.480 fights in the bronx and the lessons he learned from boxing and his father about personal responsibility

00:00:47.760 managing fear overcoming resistance and what it means to be a man after the show's over check out

00:00:52.540 our show notes at aom.is slash atlas teddy joins me now via skype

00:00:57.200 all right teddy atlas welcome to the show thank you appreciate it so you are an espn analyst for

00:01:13.420 the sport of boxing you've also trained 18 world champions and you're also the author of the book

00:01:19.360 it's atlas from the streets to the ring a son struggled to become a man and you've also started

00:01:24.700 a podcast the fight so i just finished your book atlas and it's an amazing story it's about your

00:01:31.540 story of how you started you became a world-class boxing trainer and what's interesting the story of

00:01:37.020 how that process began begins when you were a child you were the son of a respected doctor who

00:01:44.020 worked really hard and but somehow you know despite being the son of a respected doctor you end up being

00:01:50.400 a high school dropout and you end up start committing crime like how did how did that happen so my father

00:01:55.640 was a gp a general practitioner at staten island he took care of everybody he took care of all the poor

00:02:00.080 took care of people that fell through the cracks and as part of that he built his hospital that had

00:02:07.280 22 beds and it was called sunnyside hospital before a very old saddle bridge was built and he took care

00:02:13.620 of people that you know this was way before the idea of obamacare or there were no hmos there was 0.90

00:02:19.560 really really it was basically nothing if you didn't just have a doctor like this or and there wasn't too

00:02:25.440 many of them i don't think that existed but or if you didn't you'd wind up in a clinic in the clinic

00:02:31.220 it might not be the greatest care in the world so my father wanted these people to have the best care

00:02:37.860 possible so he built his hospital so they would get the proper hospital care and he would absorb the

00:02:42.800 cost the people that had money that had proper insurance that would obviously keep the place open

00:02:48.420 and as i said the rest of it he he'd find a way to absorb it he would just make a little less money

00:02:55.600 that's all and this hospital lasted for about 25 years and then the city built the bridge and they

00:03:03.000 came in and where the hospital was was where the highway was going to be so they they bought it from

00:03:08.080 they tore it down he wound up finding another hospital which yes a few years later called doctor's

00:03:14.940 hospital with 60 other doctors but he was the original founder the only way he could be with him was to go

00:03:20.420 on house calls he did house calls till he was 80 charging five dollars and he didn't charge when he

00:03:27.080 went to a lot of places he went into the projects he went to a lot of places that a lot of other doctors

00:03:31.680 didn't go and he didn't charge if if he called not to charge he didn't charge so i to steal time and that's

00:03:39.600 what i was doing i was stealing time i was just a kid i was only seven eight nine ten eleven you know

00:03:46.260 kept going maybe 12 13 and that's how i that's how i got to be with him go on house calls go to the

00:03:55.100 hospital when he went for the visits and so i figured that i i guess i i wasn't i want him to be

00:04:04.580 at baseball games i wanted to throw a football with him i wanted to other things and you know this is

00:04:11.480 going to sound selfish and it is it is selfish because i was just thinking about what i wanted

00:04:15.840 obviously you know we we all have that habit at some point and so even though i was with him it was

00:04:24.320 only under these conditions where it was you know on on the terms of his life on the on his turf so to

00:04:31.500 speak and i guess i wanted him in other places in my life and so with my infinite wisdom

00:04:37.940 of basically being an idiot as i got older i started to get in trouble because i realize it now 0.72

00:04:47.560 the people that got his attention were the injured the fractured the the messed up in some cases and 0.98

00:04:55.840 the sick so i got sick i got i got sick in a different way you know and i i started uh getting

00:05:03.240 on the streets and getting into things not good things and i thought it would get his attention

00:05:09.580 and that was obviously you know i guess the definition of a misdirected kid i definitely

00:05:18.260 was misdirected but and i'm not trying to make it more or better than it was because

00:05:23.940 there's a righteousness in thinking that you're doing something there's a cause behind it there's

00:05:29.660 a purpose behind it there's a there's a right behind it i guess that's where the word is derived

00:05:34.300 from and i did think there was a right behind it i did think that it it gave me the key

00:05:40.840 to the place i wanted to go which was to him and they got out of control quite frankly and i got to

00:05:50.060 bad places i'm blessed i'm in a good place i got to a good place you know but unfortunately it

00:05:56.800 it took a took a couple detours to kind of get there yeah i mean you ended up in in prison

00:06:03.040 a few times i mean did that get his attention i mean i'm sure it did but not in the way you wanted

00:06:08.160 yeah it got his attention but it it wrecked havoc on my on my home because he was a believer 1.00

00:06:17.740 that you were accountable he was the greatest teacher i ever had and he never he didn't talk a lot

00:06:24.980 the only person he talked a bit to was me when we were on our car drives for house calls when i

00:06:30.680 would ask questions but he was a believer in doing not speaking and so he was a great teacher in action

00:06:39.320 so i learned from him that you know the most important thing was to be accountable for your

00:06:45.420 actions and so it was maybe a lesson i didn't want to accept it at that point because

00:06:53.720 there's there's one thing about talking about being accountable there's another damn thing about

00:06:58.660 being accountable but the idea seems pretty damn good until sometimes it it's there but i i mean to

00:07:09.280 give you an example i i was a kid i was a wayward on the streets and i got hit with a tie iron one time

00:07:16.800 in a fight i wound up my friends took me to his office and bleeding all over the place i thought

00:07:24.640 i had the privilege of going right to the front of the line the nurse took me right to the front of 1.00

00:07:28.520 the line when he saw me he said let him wait with everybody else my father had the biggest practice

00:07:34.080 on stat now probably one of the biggest practices in new york because he took care of everybody took care

00:07:39.460 the people that you know didn't have anything so i waited four hours whatever it was and when it

00:07:48.060 finally came my turn the nurse did what a nurse does she came with the needle of novocaine and he 0.99

00:07:53.940 looked at her and he said what is that for and obviously she said it was to you know inject the

00:08:01.760 novocaine and obviously he knew but he said he doesn't want that if he's going to live a life like

00:08:09.560 this he's got to know how it feels and of course i said i didn't want it and you know i got 15 stitches

00:08:15.980 put into my head without novocaine not the worst thing in the world but not not the greatest thing

00:08:20.740 either and so when i wound up in prison well my father wasn't going to give me novocaine for that

00:08:28.720 so he refused to pay bail and again it's you you do something you accept what goes with it

00:08:34.880 you accept being in jail in this case rikers island and it took my mother who obviously didn't come from

00:08:42.500 the exact school that he came from because she's her mother it's a little different and it took her

00:08:49.740 threatening him took a little time but to eventually get him to put up bail to get me out and he was right

00:08:57.120 my mother was right too she's a mother but he was right ultimately he was right but these were

00:09:03.900 and again i i wasn't i was getting his attention but not obviously when you get to that kind of

00:09:13.540 confused place things are confused things are a little haywire and i wasn't obviously maybe listen

00:09:21.600 i maybe this is human nature i don't want to say this and i've never said this before

00:09:25.780 and it just came to me now and i hate to say it as i'm saying it but we are supposed to say

00:09:31.320 what the truths that we know if we're going to talk we're supposed to at least and maybe i was

00:09:37.760 trying to get even with him maybe i was trying to hurt him i you know i just now it hit me how could

00:09:43.780 i avoid the possibility that that could have been possible i hate to because he was old he was the

00:09:50.940 greatest man i knew but um as i speak yeah yeah that's that's a possibility that that was

00:09:58.720 you know lines get blurred and it's possible that line was blurred into that we're trying to get his

00:10:03.880 attention but at the same time in my selfish world trying to get back at him maybe a little bit that

00:10:11.140 i didn't have what i wanted yeah and was it during this time or this tumultuous time in your

00:10:17.860 your young adult life that you discovered boxing or had you boxed you know even as a child yeah i

00:10:23.220 boxed as a teenager and uh i was during this time it was a little before this time but it was you know

00:10:30.160 right right at the beginning of this time where i was getting into fights in the street i was hanging

00:10:35.860 out down in a tough neighborhood and a friend of mine was a boxer kevin rooney who later on led mike

00:10:43.040 tyson when custom auto passed away he led mike tyson to you know to world titles and made a lot

00:10:49.700 of money he was he was my childhood friend and we hung out on the corner together down in stapleton

00:10:57.000 area of staten arm and i followed him to the gym it was a pal gym little dingy place that's all it

00:11:04.360 needed to be and pal is police athletic league which they no longer exist in new york but at that time

00:11:12.600 they did and it was a haven for a lot of kids and i went in there with kevin and boxed in there and

00:11:20.600 then later on when i started getting into more trouble i got an opportunity to go upstate with

00:11:27.400 cuss which was provided by kevin obviously and i shouldn't say obviously it turned out that kevin

00:11:34.180 wound up going to cuss after he won the new york own gloves he went upstate to custom auto

00:11:38.740 who was semi-retired to train with him to become a pro ultimately and about four months after kevin

00:11:45.280 went up there i got into serious trouble where i was facing serious time 10 years and at that time

00:11:51.500 during the period that i was going to be out when my father finally did pay bail i was going to be

00:11:57.220 out kevin didn't want me to get into more trouble so he said why don't you come up to catskill

00:12:02.020 and and stay here with cuss and and me so i wound up going up to catskill continuing to box at a

00:12:10.200 higher level i won the gold gloves up there that around that gold gloves and you know the story went

00:12:16.260 to that you know it transitioned to that that place right and that's where you began you know getting

00:12:23.280 your feet wet with training how did that happen would did cuss see something in you that you could 0.88

00:12:27.340 be a potential trainer and he started nudging you in that direction cuss was a master psychologist

00:12:33.720 manipulator don't take that the wrong way because you know you can be a good person and know how to

00:12:41.460 maneuver and manipulate people as part of the magic of being successful with people being a mover of

00:12:49.180 people you know being a motivator uh inspiration to people so cuss had that ability and he used it 0.68

00:12:56.940 when he needed to and he said i was still he said i was a born teacher sounded good and um he said that i

00:13:04.720 was you know i was born to teach and that even though i had no interest in being a trainer at the

00:13:14.900 time he said that i could help people i could i could do more than i could even do for myself if i

00:13:21.820 was to become a champion that i could i could develop fighters and help people get to a place they

00:13:28.340 wouldn't normally get to themselves and uh and i'd be with them during that journey a piece of me would

00:13:33.400 be in the ring with them that's the exact way he put it to try again to maneuver me to do something

00:13:38.240 i wasn't inclined to do i wasn't inclined to dedicate my life to being a trainer to helping other people

00:13:44.000 i was still at that selfish phase where hey and look success is attached to selfish too so it's not

00:13:51.220 like you have to apologize for it all the time unless it gets out of hand but i was at the place where

00:13:58.080 i wanted to be a fighter the idea was i was going to turn pro i had an injury i had a

00:14:03.360 back injury and kush used that he used that situation to talk me into being a trainer it

00:14:11.400 didn't take with me right away but he kept at it you know he kept at it and i was a believer in

00:14:18.700 loyalty it was it was a thing that i you know again it was taught by my father the man who didn't talk

00:14:25.400 too much you know loyalty is attached to commitment loyalty is attached to you know just doing what you're

00:14:32.520 supposed to do right loyalty commitment keeping your word you know living up to living up to whatever

00:14:39.200 it is that you've obligated yourself to and so that was that was something that was important to me so

00:14:48.900 when kush said i couldn't fight i couldn't go somewhere else there was no thought of that if kush said i

00:14:55.680 couldn't i couldn't so the option was go back on the street doing what i was doing or become a

00:15:02.500 trainer eventually kush got me to that place it it took a little while we took some side roads to get

00:15:09.020 there that got me in trouble again but eventually i kind of succumbed to kush's insistence that i would

00:15:18.560 be uh a good trainer and then he started calling me the young master he he again he understood how to

00:15:26.580 move people he understood the psychology he understood what you needed to hear so i eventually

00:15:32.720 i eventually stayed up there at some point and i started training all these fighters these i started

00:15:39.560 developing a a gym because you got to remember kush was semi-retired at the time so there was nobody

00:15:46.720 up there there was me kevin rooney maybe three other people maybe four and when i 19 year old 18 19

00:15:54.740 year old kid and i started putting time into training kids in the gym kids started coming they

00:16:03.480 started coming from all different areas and next thing you know we went from having nobody in the gym to

00:16:10.220 20 people then 30 then 40 we had a real gym 50 people and i trained them all i trained the amateurs

00:16:19.080 at night and jimmy jacobs who was very close best friends with kush wealthy man owned the biggest fight

00:16:26.380 film collection in the world him and bill caden later on you the fight fans know who they are they were

00:16:32.180 the guys that managed mike tyson's career at its most formidable stage and they you know they basically

00:16:40.280 funded kush and they sent pros up there so i would train the pros in the day and i would train

00:16:48.860 amateurs at night i had no time but it was good i was committed to something and i created a real

00:16:56.220 gym up there with kush's you know belief behind me that's all i needed his belief behind me and again

00:17:03.140 i wasn't getting paid anything but kush knew how to pay me he would call me the young master and that

00:17:10.060 i think people listening understand that you need to hear things like that sometimes you don't know

00:17:15.580 if it's always true but you hope it is and it feels good you know it feels good you at the time you

00:17:22.260 you probably wouldn't be lying if you've said it felt just as good as getting paid maybe later on

00:17:28.920 you you it might not but at the time it did and you were you know i was i was i was in there day and

00:17:37.540 night in that gym and then after about four a few years i was up there about seven years training

00:17:44.240 fighters it turned out at the end but after several years of developing this gym a guy named mike tyson

00:17:51.200 came along and you know i developed him for another four years before i wound up leaving

00:17:57.340 we're gonna take a quick break for your words from our sponsors and now back to the show one part you

00:18:03.680 dig into in the book about how you train these young fighters were these you take them to these smokers

00:18:09.580 i think it was down in the bronx right what what were these because i've never heard of these before but

00:18:15.200 they just sounded really intense yeah they were intense they were again you know people that are

00:18:20.700 not knowing of what it is are gonna say it sounds dark and dangerous and maybe it is maybe it did but

00:18:29.580 you have to understand they were in the south bronx where there was nothing but bombed out buildings

00:18:35.800 and people in stairwells shooting up and lost people sometimes on some of the streets where

00:18:44.440 to a certain extent the police didn't go to certain neighborhoods they left it alone a little bit

00:18:51.120 unless unless they were forced to go and you'd have a lot of bombed out buildings and then you'd have a

00:18:57.280 building that was there that was actually maybe the safest most positive thing in the neighborhood

00:19:05.560 it was a boxing club the one i went to a lot was the apollo then later the jerome and then there was castle hill

00:19:12.240 there was there was so many of them but the ones in the bronx was the apollo and it was right

00:19:21.400 where the l the l would run right across on the same level as it so it would shake the whole building

00:19:27.680 sparks would go up and it would rumble by you couldn't hear anything for those couple minutes

00:19:33.740 three flights of steps to get up there as i said already you'd you'd walk past you know you'd you'd

00:19:40.080 smell urine you'd see discarded needles you might see somebody possibly shooting up so yeah i mean as i

00:19:46.960 say it now people are saying teddy what do you mean it sounds like it could be a little dark and they

00:19:51.640 yeah it had that but it was a safe and the safest place for these kids anywhere from ages 10 i'll tell

00:20:00.580 you sometimes maybe a little less and again i'm going into that area where people are going to say

00:20:04.640 is that responsible well is it responsible being in a neighborhood where you could get shot is it

00:20:09.400 responsible where dope is very readily available where you could get hit over the head with a pipe

00:20:15.860 stabbed but now you had a place where hopes you know hopes were formed and developed hope and dreams and

00:20:25.800 that's that's not dangerous and that's what this place was it was uh it was a few of them around

00:20:33.460 they were non-sanctioned fights so again yeah there was there was no doctors there was the aau at the time

00:20:40.720 was supposed to overlook boxing and then later on it was called the abf i think american boxing

00:20:47.540 federation usa boxing but they weren't in these places these places were they were on their own

00:20:53.520 and it was a chance for the proprietor of the place to to charge three dollars at the door

00:20:59.600 sell little cups of rum beers food and you're able to help yourself with the rent and that meant keeping

00:21:08.240 the doors open for hope where these kids could come and they could train they could train they could

00:21:14.080 box they could have a chance to get out of those places have a chance to become sugary lennon

00:21:21.580 or frido bonitas you know all these great fighters that they saw on television and they heard about on

00:21:30.000 the radio with their fathers maybe their uncles somebody in their family maybe maybe a neighbor and they

00:21:36.320 could get a chance to to become something a chance to feel better to feel better about where they were

00:21:42.820 about who they were it was important it was the most important place in the neighborhood now maybe

00:21:48.920 you understand i i gave you both sides i mean you know the other side is tough but without this side

00:21:56.480 it's unredeemable with this side it's redeemable there's a purpose to it and the place would be packed

00:22:04.480 and it was a chance for kids after the trainers did all that work teaching them the basics for months

00:22:09.560 it was a chance for them now to find out if they could be a fighter see what it was to get experience

00:22:16.600 you know you could catch with your father all day on the sidelines out in the street or in the driveway

00:22:22.480 you know if you're lucky enough to come from a place that had a driveway these kids weren't but you

00:22:28.100 could play catch with them all day but then there came a time you had to be in a game because now in a game

00:22:33.660 maybe that ball that's thrown the same way looks different why because somebody's watching because

00:22:40.420 it's a game and now you get a chance to get up to bat so you learn all these things how to hit a bag

00:22:48.080 how to throw a jab straight how to throw right hand how to follow with a hook how to move your head

00:22:52.920 to avoid punches and now you get a chance to get the real experience to find out can i do it do i want

00:22:59.940 to do it can i make the right choices when the choices come and you start learning how to be a

00:23:05.380 man you start learning how to grow up you start learning how i mean nobody outlines that to you

00:23:12.560 you're learning to be a fighter but you're learning a lot more than that and so these that's what a

00:23:19.740 smoker was so you go into these places and you're a nervous kid you're walking up those steps you got a

00:23:25.800 chance to think about turning around that's another part of being a man another part of growing up do i

00:23:31.760 keep going do i find it out do i get out do i escape or do i keep going what do i do and you get up there

00:23:39.600 and you got the spanish music blaring from four foot speakers and the you know the the pom-pom drums

00:23:50.180 and all that going on you're nervous i used to joke with the kids i said don't worry i i'm not going

00:23:58.860 to tell anybody you know what i nobody else could see it and they used to look what do you mean what

00:24:05.120 do you mean you know see your heart beating out of your chest where your shirt's going up and down

00:24:10.320 and they would look at their chest real quick to see if it was true of course because they knew what

00:24:16.660 they felt i said don't worry um nobody else saw it and all these other kids in there they feel the

00:24:26.880 same way so you started to teach them how to control their emotions started to teach them what

00:24:34.600 what it was all about you started to teach them that it was okay to be scared everyone else is scared

00:24:41.960 you just wouldn't know it by looking at them but you wouldn't know it by looking at you either

00:24:46.200 because you don't even realize it you're taking the first step already in overcoming it by not

00:24:52.320 showing it and by dealing with it and then they get in the ring and they fight i'll give you an

00:24:58.060 example an extreme example i had a kid named maymore this kid came to to me in catskill gym because he

00:25:04.920 was getting picked on his lunch money would say he had no father a lot of my kids had no fathers it's

00:25:10.200 not an accident they didn't have fathers that's why they came to the gym they were looking to find

00:25:15.620 the replacement for what a father would have gave him not just in the mentoring that was part of it

00:25:22.860 somebody caring somebody telling them when they're doing something right somebody gotta be there to

00:25:28.660 tell you that or when you're doing something wrong somebody gotta be there to tell you that

00:25:32.360 it's important and it can't always be a woman nothing not taking saying all women of course they can do

00:25:39.500 the job but sometimes it's gotta be a father and this kid made more had no father so he heard about

00:25:49.820 the gym and he started showing up but the funny thing was he would show up and he leave show up leave

00:25:58.400 so i'll tell you one thing as a trainer you become a psychologist without going to school

00:26:03.420 because if you don't understand the psyche of a human being you better get the freak out of this

00:26:08.740 business because it ain't just about x's and o's it's about people it's about how people feel and

00:26:14.880 how they want to feel and what they're not feeling so after a few times of seeing this kid darting out

00:26:21.720 he was 80 pounds he was 11 years old 80 pounds so finally one day i said come over here see i had

00:26:27.900 already gotten sort of the the the profile if you want of main his name was main more i had my kids

00:26:36.020 in the gym i asked about him and they told me everything about him yeah he's got no father he

00:26:41.260 gets picked on by a kid named goo takes his lunch money and you know stuff like that so now i got i got

00:26:49.360 what i need for my kids so next time he comes in is i come over here and he's looking around like are you

00:26:56.880 talking to me come here so i i show him how to throw a jab i throw a jab out by the mirror

00:27:02.880 and then i said you try that and he tried it i said that's good that's good you could you could

00:27:09.020 have a good jab and then i tell him to throw right hand that's good wow i said have you have you trained

00:27:16.960 somewhere else he looks at me like i'm crazy he says no you sure because i don't want to find out

00:27:24.520 you train somewhere else i'm taking someone else's fighter no no no i didn't train anywhere else

00:27:28.880 all right good all right we'll come up here tomorrow bring gym short stuff six o'clock

00:27:34.320 be here let's start training and that was it that's what he needed so i would teach him he picked up very

00:27:41.760 fast but then when it came time to get in the ring and boxing sparring then he would fall apart

00:27:48.100 he wasn't ready for that it was too much so the funny thing was i was a guy that came from this

00:27:55.440 troubled past where do you think the gym was of course where else above a police station and what's

00:28:01.140 across the hall in a little place called catskill of course uh a courtroom and we're in catskill they

00:28:09.800 didn't lock the doors so we had the courtroom at night nobody there you know to most nights

00:28:16.460 i've caught was open whatever it was sort of day usually so we have the courtroom we got the police

00:28:23.560 station downstairs so when main the first time i put main into box he he ran out of the he ran right

00:28:30.560 out of the gym started crying because he was scared and he figured that probably figured that he

00:28:37.380 couldn't handle this obviously figured he was yellow well why wouldn't he figure he was yellow

00:28:42.040 he he got his lunch money taken every day so i i would go out to the gym have some of my older kids

00:28:50.040 keep it going and i go out there and talk to him and the funny thing was there was no better place to

00:28:56.420 talk you had to sit down go in the courtroom and i had fun with it a couple times i remember one time

00:29:02.400 thinking after we did this a few times because it took a while with me to get him to that place

00:29:08.200 i remember at one point i'm sitting in the in the judge's chair i couldn't help but think you know

00:29:15.000 what it's it's a lot better sitting here than on the other side where i used to sit a few years ago

00:29:21.060 and i i kind of thought like maybe i had the right to sit there now or if i didn't i still was going to

00:29:28.560 do it anyway because it was kind of it was my own way of kind of making things uh getting getting

00:29:35.020 things back uh getting back something a little bit so we would talk and i would tell him you know

00:29:41.160 i want to tell you a story and he'd be crying and then he'd start calming down a little bit i say you

00:29:49.820 know i know it's got nothing to do with you but when i was a kid i used to i used to get picked on

00:29:57.360 so you could imagine what a shocker was because i run the gym and i'm known as a former fighter and

00:30:04.140 all that stuff this kid looks up to me so he says you used to get picked on i said yeah believe it or

00:30:10.280 not yeah yeah i got picked on and some guy used to take my lunch money now he doesn't know i know

00:30:16.300 everything about him so he said well what did you do i said well i used to i used to give it to him

00:30:23.900 and then i would i'd go home and i'd cry and you know i and then i i'd feel terrible but i wouldn't

00:30:31.160 tell anybody so he said well what happened and i said well one day i just got tired of

00:30:38.660 i got tired of being hungry and i got tired of feeling this way and i started to realize that

00:30:48.480 i'm gonna keep feeling this way unless i do something about it and i started to realize that

00:30:55.420 you know the way i feel is and what i have to do is two different things if i do something

00:31:05.500 it's only gonna it's only gonna last for a minute i said how how long does a fight last

00:31:13.240 before somebody breaks it up a minute 30 seconds it's but if i keep letting this guy do this

00:31:20.640 and i keep going through what i'm going through i'm gonna keep feeling this it doesn't go away

00:31:26.360 i feel it at night i feel it in the morning i feel it during school it's forever so he said what

00:31:33.480 happened i said well you know the garbage pails where you dump your trash he said yeah i said well

00:31:39.320 one day the guy asked me for my money and i didn't give it to him he said what happened i said

00:31:44.260 he wound up in the garbage pail and he said is that true i said yeah and you know he started laughing

00:31:50.860 and i said you know he said i never knew you were afraid i said i'm afraid all the time i said but

00:31:57.740 like you just said you never know it but i'm afraid of things all the time but i'm more afraid of how

00:32:03.720 i used to feel when i didn't do something about it when i didn't stand up for myself i'm more afraid

00:32:09.760 of that because i know how long that lasts i know that lasts forever i know the other thing doesn't

00:32:15.080 last that long so we went back in the gym the next day i get him in the ring again we might get into 0.61

00:32:21.600 two minutes before he break down go to the courtroom sit in the judges chambers you know have a talk

00:32:29.640 and after about a week or two of this he got through a whole round he got through two rounds

00:32:34.800 he got through three rounds he got through four rounds and i took him to the bronx it was time to

00:32:40.320 fight but i had to find the right guy i found a kid named raul rivera raul had the same problems

00:32:46.520 as maine he was scared he was insecure he had no father he had no confidence he was picked on i put

00:32:52.900 them together and i'm telling you it was the worst fight ever for people to watch because they

00:32:59.380 grabbed each other they looked at the referee they they held on to each other they they probably

00:33:05.280 threw about a half a punch each for the whole three rounds but it was the most beautiful fight

00:33:10.760 i ever watched because it was allowing the kid main to deal with what he had to deal with at the

00:33:17.900 right temperature and to get through what he had to get through and i put him in six times in a row

00:33:23.900 six weeks in a row with each other now the proprietor nelson said teddy you're making me

00:33:30.220 throw up i mean i can't watch this stuff no more i mean i i really i'm i can't watch this you're

00:33:37.160 killing me and i said look you're gonna keep watching it you're gonna keep watching it because

00:33:42.340 this is what they need and you know what by the sixth time they were fighting they weren't grabbing

00:33:48.280 they weren't looking at the referee they were fighting and even nelson had to say i cannot

00:33:53.980 believe it i cannot believe these are the same people and that's that's what we did yeah it sounds

00:34:02.580 like you weren't weren't just teaching these kids how to box you were you were teaching them to be men

00:34:07.060 yeah i mean you weren't you weren't separating the thoughts that way or articulating it that way but

00:34:14.800 yeah yeah they were they were they were learning they were learning the magic of being a grown-up of

00:34:23.760 being a man you know what the magic is to learn and to understand that you have the choice of how you

00:34:33.160 behave not somebody else not circumstances not the environment even the environment of the south

00:34:41.340 bronx tough environment beautiful people there great people tough environment tough environment

00:34:49.320 that those things did not dictate choice they did not dictate control they did not tell you

00:34:59.640 how you had to behave you did you did and they learned that they learned that no matter what no matter

00:35:09.420 how many of these things were lined up there to have basically excuses to be less that at the end of

00:35:19.500 the day it was your choice nobody else's your choice of how to behave your choice

00:35:29.020 of what you were going to do they learned that you know what that is that's the prelude to being a man

00:35:38.020 that's what it's about yeah i mean one of the things you you you hit on this as you're describing the

00:35:44.080 story of the smokers where it's just this terrible place people shooting up dope urine whatever that's

00:35:51.380 kind of like the story of boxing in general like ever since the beginning boxing's been criticized as

00:35:56.240 barbaric low brow it's been looked down upon by the media and i'm talking going back to the 19th century

00:36:03.420 but for students of the sport you hear these amazing stories of individuals from a lot of times minority

00:36:11.480 groups irish black jews who were in lower class they were they could have gone to a life of crime but 1.00

00:36:18.900 then they found boxing and for a lot for just a few of those guys they became champions champions of

00:36:25.240 the world for most of those guys they that didn't do that they still learned about discipline controlling

00:36:31.020 emotions managing their fear those skills that you've been talking about throughout these stories

00:36:35.460 and they became champions what is a champion champion i don't know for me i don't know when i

00:36:43.680 finally was smart enough to understand this but for me now it's got less to do with gloves on your hand

00:36:50.380 and how hard a punch you can take and how great endurance you have both you know emotionally psychologically

00:36:58.260 and physical endurance it's got a lot less to do with how fast your hands are than it has to do with

00:37:04.860 how you behave and that can be equated into anything and it is you know whether it's whatever it is

00:37:13.960 whether it's to be a a teacher a carpenter a board member of you know a ceo a guy working as a laborer

00:37:24.120 but to become a champion to become someone who can make his own choices that is completely free

00:37:33.240 completely separate from the environment completely separate from what's going on in your world

00:37:40.460 what's going on around you that you can make a choice that you can say today i'm gonna be the 0.82

00:37:47.700 best freaking carpenter in the world i'm gonna be the best freaking teacher in the world i'm gonna be 0.84

00:37:53.200 the best freaking laborer in the world whatever it is because you know that it's you who makes that 0.89

00:38:01.840 choice you know that you're in control of that and that's my definition of becoming a professional 0.67

00:38:10.140 doing what you need to do no matter what goes on around you no matter how you feel when you wake up

00:38:17.500 that day but it's becoming a man it's becoming a whole person and yeah you know the greatest thing i

00:38:27.440 could say about boxing if somebody said teddy you got one minute describe describe box i would say

00:38:35.300 okay the world's not fair sometimes now they listen okay all right and maybe sometimes you feel like

00:38:44.320 you haven't been treated fair you feel like you haven't been given as good of cards as your

00:38:49.980 guy down the street was to play with so this is what boxing is on one given night you can get in the ring

00:38:59.820 if you trained hard enough if you if you cared enough if you were determined enough if you were

00:39:11.980 driven enough if you were prepared enough on one given night no matter where you came from

00:39:20.980 no matter who your parents are no matter your ethnicity your religion anything on that one given night

00:39:32.020 you could make a choice to be the best you despite everything that happened up to that point

00:39:43.160 can have your hand risen as the best as the champion of the world where everything is fair and right

00:39:54.340 on that one given night that's boxing you you've trained with 18 world champions

00:40:01.880 including michael moore who was the heavyweight champion when he beat evander holyfield i mean during

00:40:07.960 all this time you've been training kids amateurs pros and what's the hardest thing to to teach a boxer is it

00:40:15.640 that idea that they they're in control that they're in charge that they can make the choices is that the

00:40:21.000 hardest thing or is there something else yeah that's a good question um the hardest thing to teach

00:40:27.040 a fighter is to know that the hardest thing to accept to get a fighter i'm going to use that

00:40:37.320 word instead of your word okay the hardest thing no no it's all good but the hardest thing to get

00:40:42.760 somebody to accept that's what a teacher has to do to get somebody to accept is that and i'm putting

00:40:51.180 this in a most simplest way that you either have reasons why and you develop those reasons why you

00:40:59.460 can't or you have excuses why you can't bang bang that's it i know that's you know as i said as simplistic

00:41:09.220 as you can get but it's not that simple when you try to unravel it and you try to execute it but

00:41:17.540 that's what it is you either have reasons and you take those reasons because people said you couldn't 0.97

00:41:23.580 do it because they said you were yellow coward because your your stepfather says you're a piece 1.00

00:41:28.920 of garbage because you got no father because your mother is is on drugs whatever it is whatever it is 1.00

00:41:36.980 you either you take those you'd make those reasons why you're gonna do it because you just want to do 1.00

00:41:44.120 it because you just want to feel good and you know what else you just want to know who you are

00:41:48.820 i just a kid just wants to know who they are they want to know am i somebody good am i somebody

00:41:54.960 worthwhile because i heard a lot of people say i wasn't and am i somebody worthy of of something of

00:42:02.660 success of feeling good am i allowed to feel good so you either have reasons to go forward in those

00:42:09.420 directions or everything i just said take everything i just said and use it on the left

00:42:15.780 hand column as excuses why you won't and why you can't you get them to understand that and you're on

00:42:23.120 your way it's something you've also said in your in your interviews and in your book is that a fighter

00:42:29.220 isn't really a fighter until they faced resistance but what's an example of a fighter who hasn't faced

00:42:34.540 resistance forget about a fighter you in life and anything you're you're not a teacher until you

00:42:43.740 had a kid in the classroom trying to put the classroom on fire and i'm kidding around i'm

00:42:48.640 exaggerating i hope there's nobody trying to put their teachers classrooms on fire out there

00:42:55.160 please don't do that but until you've gotten a kid that doesn't let you go home so easy that that is

00:43:03.160 not so agreeable you know that that is not so committed to what you want them committed to

00:43:09.280 until you overcome that you're not a teacher until you as a doctor you open up somebody and veins

00:43:17.160 that woman is supposed to be bleeding are bleeding you're not a doctor you're just a guy that understands

00:43:24.180 the anatomy you're a guy that passed a lot of tests you're you go into a courtroom and all of a

00:43:31.440 sudden the district attorney throws a curveball all of a sudden the judge says no you can't use

00:43:36.100 that brief today i don't care that you put four months work into it no you can't you're not a lawyer

00:43:42.520 you thought you were a lawyer because you got a diploma that's up on the wall that looks pretty

00:43:48.800 freaking good but you're not a lawyer not until you deal with that not until you overcome something

00:43:55.480 you're not a fighter it's the same thing you're just a guy that's in good shape you're a guy that

00:44:03.120 has physical abilities you're a guy who inherited good genetics you're a guy who's going through an

00:44:09.540 athletic exhibition great looks good but until there's resistance until there's something to

00:44:17.380 overcome you're not a fighter and that's when a lot of fighters who maybe have that talent those genes

00:44:23.760 when they face that resistance they just that's when they give up and they don't know that idea

00:44:28.820 that it's harder to give up than it is to fight yeah that idea is so simple i'll say it again i've

00:44:34.760 been saying it for the whatever amount of time we've been talking in so many words in different words

00:44:40.160 but you know i'll say it again it is harder to quit than it is to fight because when you fight

00:44:49.940 it's over with in a second 10 seconds really i mean really am i exaggerating a fight a world title

00:44:59.660 fight if it goes the distance lands 36 minutes that's a blink of the eye in somebody's life

00:45:07.000 a blink of the eye it's a second something difficult you got to deal with a minute a half a minute five

00:45:14.800 seconds whatever it is that's how long it lasts to deal with it but you don't fight whatever your

00:45:22.520 fight is you don't deal with it and you quit you submit you give in that doesn't go away that's there

00:45:32.180 all day all night comes at the worst times to you two o'clock in the morning you can't sleep

00:45:40.140 you're laying in bed you get up you walk into the washroom you look in the mirror and there it is

00:45:48.940 there it is there it is it's still there the next day still there the next day still there yeah if

00:45:58.620 you understand it in the way i just said it the real way yeah it's damn easier to fight than it is to

00:46:06.440 quick you know you've spent your your career training men to be young men to be fighters and

00:46:12.360 men i mean you started this when you were 19 20 how is your conception of what it means to be a man

00:46:20.740 evolved since then and i'm curious i mean obviously your father has a big influence on what you think

00:46:26.620 of what a man is that whole idea of accountability but as you've gotten older have you noticed that

00:46:31.720 your father's influence has it gotten stronger or maybe even cusses or maybe other people or maybe

00:46:37.380 you've discovered things that on your own on what it means to be a man it was my father you know cuss

00:46:43.340 taught me how to put it into words taught me how to teach it how to articulate it yes he put it into

00:46:50.060 a form into usable form custard bringing man special man but the real architect of this if if you will

00:47:02.960 use such a description the former of this my father there's no greater teacher than example

00:47:10.020 there's there's no greater lessons than to watch to see that no matter how this man felt

00:47:17.600 i mean this is a guy who no matter how he felt he did what he had to do this is a guy who had to

00:47:25.340 get surgery after back in the days when when surgery in certain ways was much more evasive much more

00:47:32.920 dangerous i mean my father had a i don't know if it was a double triple hernia whatever the hell they 0.65

00:47:38.800 called it but he got it as an intern when he was interning he went to the nyu medical school

00:47:45.160 and he interned at bellevue he told me that when you got out of bellevue you're ready for everything

00:47:50.960 and he saved an obese person's life it turned out when he was a young intern the person it was a woman

00:47:59.680 had collapsed on a street he got her off the street you know pulled her to wherever he had to

00:48:05.700 and she had a heart attack he's basically he saved a life and he formed a hernia well he didn't have

00:48:14.620 time to take care of that you know so 35 years later finally he had to get it it was strangling

00:48:21.820 him now i didn't know nothing about that stuff but one day i walked into his bedroom i shouldn't

00:48:29.260 have but again i'm seven years old i'm eight years old whatever the heck i was i walk in i open the

00:48:35.000 door and there was a big mirror that was right to the left that could show you what was to the right

00:48:40.720 of the room so i looked in the mirror and there he was a way i'd never seen in my life he was bent

00:48:46.320 over obviously in pain and he had this contraption around him around his midsection around his groin area

00:48:54.560 it was a thrust i didn't know what the hell it was it was made out of leather and it was to keep his

00:49:00.080 intestines from popping out it was to keep the hernia which was popping way out to keep it in place

00:49:06.720 that's what they had in those days and i i was confused he got angry he said close the door leave

00:49:14.880 the room and of course i never forgot that you know what that told me i didn't know a damn thing

00:49:20.320 but i knew he was in pain i knew my father was in pain every day and he still did everything he was

00:49:28.940 supposed to do every day in pain every day and he waited 35 years to get the surgery got it done at

00:49:39.980 doctor's hospital that he found it and i know this is crazy and my father was eccentric okay you know

00:49:46.540 i think great people are i think special people are sometimes and maybe we call it eccentric and maybe

00:49:52.560 it's really special maybe it's what what worked for them but he he actually had given himself

00:50:01.920 some and just started to the process by giving himself something just before he got to the just

00:50:09.440 as he was walking in the hospital so by the time they got him ready he saved him time he was he was

00:50:15.920 already starting to be you know a little bit ready for the anesthesia i guess and stuff whatever they have

00:50:21.520 to give i mean he he knew what to do so they got him on the stretcher and they're taking him to the

00:50:26.800 or room and he says hold on a minute stop here at the station nurse's station stop here dr atlas we

00:50:35.040 gotta get you into the or no no no no gotta stop here i gotta i just gotta go over a couple orders

00:50:41.440 for a few patients and he had a he had a sense of humor that was very different than other people

00:50:46.880 he said just in case this don't go right he says i gotta make sure that these this poor lady gets 1.00

00:50:52.800 out of here monday i gotta make sure she gets discharged and i gotta make sure that this other 1.00

00:50:59.760 guy gets his medicines changed so so stop at the station he stopped at the station looked at the

00:51:07.200 orders made a few adjustments and then he said all right go ahead let's go take me he was supposed to

00:51:14.800 be in the hospital at least eight nine days in those days in the hospital one day now was it was

00:51:24.400 it the right way to do it no no it wasn't doctors are the worst patients we get it but he could do it

00:51:32.720 he could do it he understood it was a matter of dealing with the pain it was a matter of what

00:51:39.120 his responsibility he was back working in his office three days later he knew he could do it was

00:51:46.240 it convenient no could you do it yes and that's what i learned and that's how i learned it and to

00:51:55.840 answer your question i think i'm remembering it even though i went down this road you said what is it

00:52:02.080 what is it to be a man what is it to be this convenience that's what it is to understand the

00:52:09.520 difference between convenience and responsibility that's it that's it well teddy this has been a

00:52:16.240 great conversation where can people go to learn more about what you're doing the podcast anything

00:52:20.320 else you got going on they can oh they can go to the podcast i think you go on you i don't know much

00:52:26.240 about this stuff i'm a caveman i'm the most unsophisticated uh media guy in the world but

00:52:32.560 somebody fortunately does this for me and talked me into doing it so i have a podcast you go on youtube

00:52:39.600 and you put in the fight with teddy atlas and i know there's some itunes and other stuff that you can

00:52:45.760 go on you know on on something on uh sure and what are they what do you talk about on your podcast we

00:52:54.800 talk about life you know what i i said from the beginning i said i'm gonna use this podcast

00:53:00.480 to talk boxing but to use boxing to connect the dots in life because for me everybody's fighting

00:53:09.120 i don't mean it that way i don't mean it the way it sounds because there is a lot of fighting going on

00:53:13.360 out there but what i mean is we're all in a fight it's just a matter what the hell you're fighting for

00:53:19.360 and for me what better to use to kind of take people through things than boxing to explain the

00:53:27.760 fight they might be dealing with so i talk about boxing i connect the dots with life and um i try to

00:53:35.760 go places where maybe people would like to go but they just don't know how and i try to show them how

00:53:41.760 and i just recorded my book into an audio book when it's coming out next month so hopefully that'll

00:53:48.960 be something too that people will you know that people will find interesting fantastic well teddy

00:53:54.320 atlas thanks so much time it's been a pleasure it's my pleasure thank you my guest today was teddy

00:53:59.520 atlas you can check out his book it's called atlas from the streets to the ring a son struggled to

00:54:03.920 become a man it's a great story also check out his podcast the fight it's available on anywhere

00:54:08.640 you can listen to podcasts and check out our show notes at aom.is atlas where you find links

00:54:13.360 to resources we can delve deeper into this topic well that wraps up another edition of the aom

00:54:24.720 podcast check out our website at artofmanliness.com where you can find our podcast archives we've got

00:54:28.960 over 500 episodes there a couple episodes about boxing as well as thousands of articles we've written

00:54:33.680 over the years a lot of articles about boxing as well so if there's something that interests you

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The Art of Manliness - July 10, 2019

#524： Boxing Trainer Teddy Atlas on What It Means to Be a Man

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