FAREWELL! I'm retiring Saturday after UFC 317

Editor’s note: I got my first paying job as a sports writer in 1979, while I was still in college. It comes to an end on Saturday, as UFC 317 will be my final event. I am retiring from what I have loved for so long and wanted to do all of my life. Below is my farewell column. Thank you for all of your support over the years.

When Merv Rettemund grounded out to short to end the 1971 World Series, making the Pittsburgh Pirates the world champions, I swear that pitcher Steve Blass jumped higher than Michael Jordan ever did.

OK, Jordan was 8 on Oct. 17, 1971, when the Pirates defeated the Baltimore Orioles by a 2-1 score in Game 7, but you know what I mean. After pitching a complete game four-hitter to win the World Series, I thought Blass was going to leap over the head of Bob Robertson, the Pirates’ 6-foot-1 first baseman.

I was a 12-year-old seventh grader living in suburban Pittsburgh, and I was ecstatic.

I was also different than my friends.

Very different.

I watched the celebration on the field and listened raptly to the interviews in the clubhouse. Nothing was more important in that moment than the words those players spoke.

Unlike any other 12-year-old, when the post-game was over, I got off of my couch and headed to my bedroom to write.

I sat in front of my typewriter, a used (and very broken) 1964 Royal Safari, and wrote my account of the game.

It was probably the first of oh, I don’t know, maybe 5,000 or 10,000 times I did that in my life.

The lower case “e” didn’t work on my typewriter, so after I was done, I had to manually write them in, in ink. The shift key was very difficult to push, so I began a lot of sentences with a lower case letter.

I wrote to express my joy that the Pirates had won. I wrote because even then, I had something to say. I loved it.

I’d lay in bed as a boy when the Pirates or Penguins were on the West Coast listening to the game on the radio, imagining myself making the game-saving catch, scoring the winning goal, or hitting the dramatic home run.

If I wasn’t asleep when the game ended, I’d interview myself, asking cliched questions and giving even more cliche answers.

I may have done it before; I just don’t remember. I happened to save that piece and had it for close to 50 years.

I lost track of it a few years ago, and I’m honestly not sure if it’s still somewhere in the house or gone for good.

But that was soon to be my life — watching a sporting event, and then writing a story about the outcome.

That ends today.

This is my last story. More than 53 years after that piece on the World Series, more than 40 years after graduating college, I’m retiring.

Finally.

Yep, you’re rid of me.

Never did I want to do anything other than what I’ve done. It was never work and almost always fun.

Surviving the plane crash

It was even fun on the day in 2002 in Big Bear Lake, Calif., when I almost died in a plane crash. We were flying from Las Vegas to Big Bear to attend media day at Oscar De La Hoya’s training camp. He would be fighting Fernando Vargas in a few weeks.

We crashed into a dry lake bed. Someone yelled to get off the plane because the wings were on fire. As we gathered at the front of the plane to make sure everyone was accounted for, firemen yelled to us to get away from the plane because it was loaded with fuel.

We ran about 100 yards when, yep, the plane exploded and burned to a crisp.

Later, we were driven to De La Hoya’s camp, where Oscar took a seat in front of a large group of reporters. I was late because I was interviewed about the crash.

A public relations person placed a chair literally to De La Hoya’s right — everyone else was facing him — and motioned for me to sit.

De La Hoya grinned and asked how I rated such treatment.

“I almost died coming here to see you and you have to ask me that?” I said.

The only athlete or celebrity I was ever starstruck around was Muhammad Ali. I was never fortunate enough to cover an Ali fight — I was just getting going as a journalist as he was retiring as a boxer — but I’ll never forget meeting him in person for the first time.

I was covering an athletic commission meeting which Ali was going to appear. I did a live shot with a Las Vegas television station, laying out my expectations for the meeting.

As I hustled inside for the start of the meeting, a long-time friend, Gene Kilroy, called to me. At the time, Kilroy was a casino host at the MGM, but he will always be best known for being Ali’s business manager and close friend.

I mentioned that I was late for the meeting, but he said insistently, “Get over here.”

If you know Gene, you know you don’t say no to him. I walked over and he took me around the corner, and there sat Ali. I let out an audible noise as if I’d just seen God.

In my life, there was my Dad, my Mom, my brother and Muhammad Ali.

This introduction came at a time when Ali struggled to speak. He gently pulled my head toward him so he could speak into my ear.

“You must be the greatest based on what my friend has said about you,” he said after Kilroy had introduced us. 

My heart was pounding.

“Thank you, sir,” was all I could muster, my voice cracking.

Later, I called my father and said, “You’re never going to guess what Muhammad Ali said to me today.”

Covering Pac versus Money May

Much like that moment, I was filled with awe, wonder and excitement as I entered the MGM Grand Garden Arena on May 2, 2015, to cover yet another fight card. It was one of thousands I’d been to, but this one stood apart.

It was on that day that Floyd Mayweather fought Manny Pacquiao, a bout between the two best fighters in the world that had been bandied about for more than five years.

A few moments before the fighters walked out, I turned to Tim Dahlberg, the Associated Press columnist who was seated next to me, and said, “Dude, this is our Ali-Frazier.”

If you know me, you know what a compliment that was. To this day, the heavyweight title fight between Ali and Joe Frazier on March 8, 1971, remains the greatest sporting event in history.

It was no fun writing obituaries of my heroes, but I wrote obits for Ali, Smokin’ Joe, Big George Foreman, Marvelous Marvin Hagler and way too many more.

Too many fighter deaths

I also sat ringside for the deaths of seven boxers.

Two of them came within a three-month span in 2005.

I covered the monthly Guilty Boxing card at The Orleans in Las Vegas on July 1, 2005. In the main event, Martin Sanchez fought Rustam Nugaev.

There was nothing in the fight that suggested it would turn fatal. I was seated at ringside on the ring apron, in a neutral corner, next to my friend, the late Dave Cokin.

Sanchez and Nugaev were fighting in the ninth round directly across from us. Nugaev landed a punch that hurt Sanchez. He backed up. Nugaev landed a straight right. Sanchez staggered back, hit the ground and rolled under the ropes.

He was going to fall off the apron to the floor, but Cokin and I put our hands up and stopped him from doing so. Sanchez rolled back under the ropes, and took a knee in the corner near us as referee Kenny Bayless counted to 10.

As Sanchez was leaving the ring, ring announcer Joe Martinez (who now occasionally does UFC fights) urged the crowd to give him a hand.

Sanchez stopped on the top step and blew a kiss to the crowd. He spotted Cokin and I out of the corner of his eye, pointed at us, and gave us a thumbs up for keeping him from hitting the floor.

I left after finishing my story and never thought twice about the fight.

The next morning, I received a call from a p.r. person who said that Sanchez had collapsed in his locker room and died overnight in surgery. He’d suffered a bleed on the brain.

I wish it was an isolated incident, but it was not. Leavander Johnson defended his world lightweight title against Jesus Chavez on Sept. 17, 2005, at the MGM Grand Garden.

This was a brutally one-sided affair, and some of my colleagues from ringside were shouting during the second half of the fight for the bout to be stopped.

It was finally halted in the 11th round. Johnson collapsed in his locker room with a blood clot on his brain.

I went to the hospital early Sunday morning, the day after the fight. I was speaking to Leavander’s father, Bill Johnson, when Chavez showed up. Chavez was devastated and was clearly fighting back tears.

Leavander was desperately fighting for his life.

Chavez walked to Bill Johnson, saying repeatedly, “I’m sorry, sir. I’m so sorry, sir.” Bill Johnson was extraordinarily gracious.

He said, “Champ, you just did your job.” The two men embraced and tears flowed everywhere.

Four days later, Johnson’s family removed him from life support and he passed.

In the aftermath, I did a series on safety in boxing and made recommendations, many of which were adopted by the Nevada Athletic Commission after a summit it held.

Tiger's first PGA Tour win

I covered Tiger Woods’ first professional win, which came at the Las Vegas Invitational in 1996 in a playoff with Davis Love III. Years earlier, I covered a junior golf tournament — I believe it was an American Junior Golf Association event — in Henderson, Nev., and asked a teen-aged Tiger for an interview.

He declined.

I walked away and was looking at the pairing sheets trying to figure out who I was going to write about when I was interrupted by a man who approached me.

“Excuse me, sir, are you the gentleman who was interested in speaking with young Mister Woods,” the man asked. 

“Yes, sir,” I responded. As I began to explain that Woods wasn’t interested, this man interrupted and said, “If you still would like to speak to him, he’d be happy to speak to you now.”

I didn’t realize it at the moment, but that was Earl Woods, Tiger’s father.

In 1996, the Las Vegas Invitatonal was a 90-hole pro-am event played at three courses, and Woods got into the field on a sponsor’s exemption.

I had a big profile piece of Woods on 1A of the paper on Wednesday morning, the day the tournament opened. Woods injured himself in the first round and there was a question of whether he’d be able to continue or be forced to withdraw.

So I wrote a story talking about Woods’ round and indicated it was 50-50 if he’d play or not.

During Round 2, Fred Funk shot a low round at one of the remote courses. Lee Patterson, the PGA Tour media official, asked those of us in the media headquarters at TPC Summerlin if we wanted Funk. We said yes.

Funk appeared by remote camera. He started to discuss his round and then said he got really fired up by reading the morning paper. I perked up since I was writing for the morning paper.

Funk said some variation of, “The guy who writes for the morning paper knows nothing about golf because he writes about nothing but Tiger Woods. There was a lot of good golf yesterday and all this guy is writing about is Tiger, Tiger, Tiger.”

I was about to burst. Dahlberg was next to me and was laughing at me trying to contain my anger. Patterson looked at me in horror, afraid of what I might say.

I did say something — We’ll leave my exact words between Funk, Patterson, Dahlberg and myself — and let Fred know what I thought of his comment. I mentioned that 99 percent of the gallery was following Woods’ every shot.

From that day forward, whenever I was with Dahlberg and Funk’s name came up, we both repeated in unison, “Fuck Fred Funk.”

I’d also like to take the opportunity to remind Mr. Funk that after that event, Woods won 81 more times on the PGA Tour. Funk won four more.

My laptop was almost swiped in a bull ring in Mexico

I got my first paying journalism job while I was still in college, in 1979. It’s 46 years later and I still love it.

I learned that people aren’t shy about sharing their opinions about your work and about you as a person. 

I’ve been called just about every name in the book, mostly by people on the internet who acted tough because they never had to look the person they were insulting in the eye.

At least I’ll give the two kids in the parking lot who confronted me three or four years ago credit.

I was walking through the parking lot, going to a yoga class. Two young guys in their early 20s were coming toward me. One of them said, “Hey, aren’t you Kevin Iole, the MMA writer?”

I smiled and said, “Yes.”

The kid responded, “Dude, you absolutely suck,” and batted my Pirates cap off of my head.

He was better than the fan in Cancun, Mexico, who nearly swiped my laptop while I was interviewing Samuel Peter after he knocked out Oleg Maskaev to win the WBC heavyweight title on March 8, 2008.

Peter was brought to ringside to talk to the handful of journalists covering the event. He was in front of me but a step to my left. I’m listening to him speak and something bumped my leg.

The fight was held in a bull ring, so I was hoping it wasn’t one of the cow chips that were blowing around.

Instead, it was a guy who had jumped out of the stands and was about to lift my laptop and run away with it. I turned and managed to grab it, foiling the theft. I still wonder how I’d have explained that.

This is getting long, like my career, so I’ll wrap with one more story.

Hanging up on Iron Mike

In 2003, as Mike Tyson was preparing to fight Clifford Etienne, I was invited to watch him train.

I arrived at the old Golden Gloves Gym in Las Vegas with Dahlberg. Trainer Freddie Roach was in the ring with Tyson. An attractive woman who turned out to be the actress, Meg Ryan, was shooting photographs.

A week or so before, I’d written what had been a complimentary column on Tyson, so I expected him to be in a good mood.

I got a call from someone the day after the column came out who identified himself as Tyson. The person acting as Tyson was praising the column and thanking me for it.

I listened for a while until I was tired of being played.

“Dude,” I said, “This is the worst Tyson impersonation I have ever heard. Give up on it.”

I hung up the phone, proud of myself.

As the five of us walked into the tiny dressing room Tyson was using, Tyson looked at me and said, “Man, Kevin, I’m disappointed. I called you the other day to thank you for the story and you hung up on me and treated me like an N.”

I was dumbfounded.

“That was you?” I asked, incredulous.

It was only then, in front of Roach, Dahlberg and Ryan, that I realized that it wasn’t a bad Tyson impersonator I’d hung up on.

It was Tyson himself.

I laughed, and thankfully, Mike did, too.

It's been a blast

My career was so much fun and I tried my best, whether it was reporting on an American Legion baseball game in Springdale, Pa., a girls high school field hockey game in Burlington, Vt., or the Mayweather-Conor McGregor boxing match in Las Vegas.

The Mayweather-McGregor fight was massive — it sold 4.4 million pay-per-views, the second-largest figure in history — but T-Mobile Arena staff booted the media the moment the post-fight press conference ended.

I sat outside on a rock in front of the arena writing my column on one of the biggest fights I ever covered.

It was a blast. 

I hope I was able to entertain along the way.

Thank you.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart. Without you, I couldn’t have lived this dream for nearly half a century.

My time has come and I now walk away.

I’ll never forget those I’ve met along the way.

When your time comes, may you be in Heaven a full half-hour before the devil knows you’re dead.

Honors

• Inducted into Nevada Boxing Hall of Fame

• Inducted into Springdale High School Hall of Fame

• Nominated for international Boxing Hall of Fame

• Outstanding Journalist, Nevada Press Association, 1999

• Nat Fleischer Award, 2007, Boxing Writers Association of America, career excellence in boxing journalism

• Multiple time winner, state Sportswriter of  the Year, Nevada and Vermont, National Sportswriters & Sportscasters Association