By Mitch Abramson
It was getting late but Christian Martinez, a boxer from the Bronx, kept talking, about his pro debut, about fighting at Yankee Stadium, about suffering his first loss. He was laid back in discussing his career, as if his ring days were long behind him. It was nearly 2 a.m., but Martinez wasn’t retired. He was just tired, worn out by the shenanigans, real and imagined he’s had to put up with since turning pro in 2008.
“I’ve learned a lot in my career so far,” he says as the clock ticks toward 2:30. “A lot.”
He’s just 4-1 with four knockouts and is sidelined with a bum left hand that won’t get better, a reputation for trouble that still follows him- despite winning a settlement against New York City for a wrongful arrest. Despite the presence of a high-powered manager and promoter in his corner, Martinez’s career seems to have stalled because of an injury that lingers and the decision to fight in another boxer’s backyard that didn’t work out as planned.
“He’s supposed to be the next up- and-coming champ,” says the female fighter, Melissa Hernandez, speaking from Philadelphia, where she helped the super featherweight Ronica Jeffrey win a fight on Friday. Hernandez and Martinez trained together at several New York City gyms in the amateurs.
“He just has so much talent,” she went on. “In the amateurs, nobody wanted to mess with him. He had to almost hide to get fights. He had one punch knockout power. He was a powerhouse. You always thought he was going to be a champion because of how easily things came to him.”
He still hasn’t moved on from his last fight, which he lost in bizarre fashion when his opponent tackled him to the canvas. That was nearly a year ago. His hand remains in a splint, and he’s still awaiting an MRI to see if he needs surgery. Martinez, who says he also deals with asthma, could possibly fight on the undercard of Miguel Cotto and Antonio Margarito at Madison Square Garden on Dec. 3 if he is ready by then, says Brad Goodman of Top Rank, his promoter.
For now, his future remains cloudy.
“I don’t know when I’m going to be fighting next,” the 24-year-old says. “But when I do, I want to make sure things are in place and go smooth, better than before.”
An exciting show took place in the Bronx on Friday at the Paradise Theater featuring a top-flight prospect. The talented Eddie Gomez, like Martinez, a Daily News Golden Gloves champion, made his East Coast debut in the co-feature, blowing out an overmatched Marcus Hall in just one round, dropping him to the canvas three times.
Martinez was nowhere to be seen on Friday, hanging out with his girlfriend instead of making the trip to the Bronx. Still, Martinez’s name was brought up in conversation by those in attendance, who wondered when he was fighting next. When told he was dealing with an injury, one onlooker just shook his head.
“He won the Golden Gloves with a broken hand,” said Mike "Biggie" O'Connor with a laugh. “He’s won lots of his fight with bad hands. He was still knocking people out.”
Martinez remains one of the more fascinating and compelling fighters to pass through the boxing landscape because of that talent: a ferocious puncher with a calm and calculated way about him in the ring. He is managed by the respected Craig Hamilton and promoted by Top Rank, both of whom started working with him after he turned pro.
He knocked out his first four opponents, including a former amateur standout in his pro debut. There’s a quiet, almost menacing quality about the way Martinez fights: the way he holds his hands high, protecting a handsome, expressionless face, how he patiently stalks his opponent, the smooth combinations.
“I don’t think there’s ever been a question about his talent,” Hamilton says. “There’s not too many guys his size who can punch like that; it’s the intangibles that we’re waiting on. Every guy has a different makeup. There are different things that get in the way. I’m as anxious to see how he progresses as anyone.”
Still, there is a dark cloud that seems to hang above Martinez, mostly because of his troubled past. Martinez admits that promoters and managers were initially scared off by a rap sheet that included a year in jail for possession of a firearm, and there are those who silently wonder if his troubles are really behind him.
“You just hope that he doesn’t go back to that lifestyle,” Hernandez says. “Christian is a very sweet kid; he’s someone you could invite over to dinner and he can talk to anyone but you hope he doesn’t give into the peer pressure. When you’re from the ghetto, there are those who don’t want you to succeed, who will bring you down.”
Martinez was busted in early 2009 for allegedly possessing 332 grams of cocaine at an East New York apartment where he was apparently staying. The charges were later dropped when a grand jury determined the drugs belonged to someone else at the residence. Because of his prior arrests, Martinez was facing 25 years to life in prison, according to the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office. Martinez sued the city and was awarded a settlement last November in the amount of $30,000 in a civil suit for false imprisonment and wrongful arrest, according to Martinez’s lawyer, Patrick Hayes, his court-appointed attorney who represented him on the initial charge. Hayes believes that Martinez could have made “four times” the amount if Martinez had gone to court, but Martinez wanted to settle quickly.
“[The NYPD was] wrong what they did, and they kind of smeared his name," Hayes says. "He felt they smeared his name."
According to police sources, Martinez was also arrested in 2005 for theft of service, which his father, Edwin said was jumping a turnstile, and in 2006, for robbery and criminal possession of a weapon, which led to the year in jail, and in 2007 for a DWI. Martinez has tried hard to distance himself from his volatile past. He is taking college classes at ASA in Brooklyn and is trying to get his associate’s degree with an eye toward perhaps working in sports medicine. In person, Martinez, who now lives in Richmond Hill, Queens, is friendly and kind and open to discussing his troubled history, the good and bad.
“That’s my past,” he says. “It was just ignorance and silly stuff. That stuff doesn’t bother me anymore and I look at it as an experience to learn from. I’m aiming to get better in every way.”
In between the legal troubles, Martinez showed promise in the ring, winning a Daily News Golden Gloves title in 2005 at 132 pounds open, the tougher of the two divisions. (He can't remember if his hand was broke but admits his left hands has been fractured numerous times.) He won his pro debut in December of 2008, blitzing Murray Cunningham in the first round. Cunningham was an amateur star from Rochester who wasn’t supposed to lose like that. In his fourth fight, Martinez nearly decapitated a sturdy fighter named Jonathan Cuba last June at Yankee Stadium, the first boxing match ever held at the new palace in the Bronx.
He hit a snag in his last fight, though, a six-round decision loss to Jose Peralta Alejo on Oct. 30 of last year in Atlantic City, N.J. It was a wild match. Martinez wobbled Alejo in the second round with a short left hook. Trying to hang on and buy himself time, Alejo tackled Martinez to the canvas, nearly tearing off his boxing trunks in the process.
Rather than deduct a point for a foul, the referee Allan Huggins, let the fight go on, but not before he took a point away from Martinez in the fifth round for a low blow. It all led to a unanimous decision win for Alejo and the first career loss for Martinez.
Hamilton filed a written protest to the New Jersey State Athletic Control Board to have the decision overturned. He was denied by Commissioner Aaron Davis, who reviewed the fight on tape after seeing it live before making his decision.
“It’s up to the referee if he wants to take a point away,” Davis said in a phone interview after reviewing his written decision in the case. “I don’t think the referee did anything improper. This sport is very subjective. It’s up to the ref to make a decision. He didn’t do anything wrong. I know it’s kind of in right now to talk about the referee but I didn’t think he did anything wrong in that fight.”
Hamilton acknowledged that he put his fighter in a tough situation by having him go against someone who was perceived to be a “hometown fighter,” saying that Martinez would only fight on Top Rank cards in the future. Alejo is from Jersey City and had ties to Pat and John Lynch, who helped put on the show, through his trainer. Goodman, a matchmaker for Top Rank, wasn’t involved in the bout but says when told of the conditions: “I wouldn’t have made that fight.”
“It was a fight that was somewhat misrepresented to us,” Hamilton admits. “A situation like that won’t ever arise again. His fights will be completely Top Rank fights. That’s how it will go for us.”
Pat Lynch, who later signed Alejo to a managerial contract after the fight, disputes that Martinez was set up for a fall. Lynch wasn’t Alejo’s manager for the fight and his brother, John, didn’t promote Alejo, either. Alejo got the Martinez fight as a favor to his trainer Mike Skowronski, who was letting Alejo sleep at his gym, Lynch said.
“The deck wasn’t stacked against Christian,” Lynch says. “I wasn’t even his manager for that fight and he wasn’t signed with my brother, either. Mike was just trying to get him a fight to help him out.”
Though he protested the fight, Hamilton believes that Martinez should have beaten Alejo based on his ability. Hamilton also believes that Martinez could have been in better condition for the fight. Martinez, who seemed to tire in the later rounds and didn’t have his usual bounce, believes he trained hard but that confusion over the correct time of the weigh-in the day before sapped his energy. Looking to improve his ring generalship in the future, Martinez has brought in Victor Roundtree to join his father in the corner and has also added a strength and conditioning coach.
“It was just a frustrating experience what I went through for that fight,” Martinez says. “I was upset over what happened. I had trouble losing the last few pounds and it was like I had the wind sucked out of me for that fight. I tried to gut it out the best I could.”
Of Martinez’s hand injury and why it’s taken so long to deal with, Hamilton said that Martinez is simply following doctor's orders. An MRI will determine whether he needs surgery or not.
“The doctor told him he has to rest the hand,” Hamilton said. “He’s doing what they tell him to do. I’d like to say he’ll be back in three months, but I don’t have a time table. It’s frustrating for him, for me and it’s slowing everything down for now.”
Martinez wants to start training next week, and has talked about hitting the bag softly even though his left hand is still injured. He wants to resume his career, and Goodman suspects his first fight back will be “with the right type of guy to get his confidence back,” which is what he seems to need at the moment.
“Yeah I was down but I know I’m going to rebound after the loss,” Martinez says. “My goal was to retire undefeated but I guess things change. I’ve been through worse already. I know I can come back from this. I still have my goals, and the loss is not going to stop me from getting to the top.”
Mitch Abramson covers boxing for the New York Daily News and BoxingScene.com