Date: Wednesday, November 6th, 1996
Reporter: Jody Heaps

LAS VEGAS - Wednesday. Near the corner of Charleston and Main, across the street from Morgan's Termite and Pest Control and nestled between Econo Lube N Tune Auto Service and Rick's Pool Service stands Johnny Tocco's Ringside Gym.

"You know what I read in the newspapers," asked the 87 year old Johnny Tocco, unwrapping a large cigar. "I read that broads are smoking stogies. Can you believe that?"

It seems as if time has stood still inside of Tocco's gym: there are no Nautilus machines, no Stair Masters, no abb crunchers, and certainly no yuppie bankers dabbling in the manly art.

Instead, his gym, a small converted house, has been accumulating dust and dirt and champions for the last 47 years.

Today, in the back room under a low plasterboard ceiling filled with gaping holes, WBC strawweight champion, Mexico's Ricardo Lopez, is hitting the double ended bag, dancing furiously to the sounds of salsa coming from a boom box on the floor.

In the room at the front, with its row of rusty lockers, former middleweight title holder Julian Jackson is studiously throwing combinations at the heavybag and dreaming of a comeback.

And in the room with the ring, where the shag carpet is too old and too dirty to have a color, Francois Botha, the South African heavyweight, is shadowboxing silently and intently.

"They all come here," said Tocco who once trained Sonny Liston.

A photo taken there in 1987 shows Mike Tyson and Evander Holyfield standing arm in arm, smiling. Tyson had been preparing for his fight with Pinklon Thomas and Holyfield for his bout with Rick Parkey. But they had stopped their training to talk about what everybody talks about in Johnny Tocco's gym: boxing.

"There in this dingy gym are these two guys having such a good time, talking about the game they love," said Tyson's former assistant manager, Steve Lott, who took the photograph. "They talked for over an hour about all the greats of boxing without ever suspecting that one day they would meet in the ring."

Now, nine years later, the meeting in the ring between these two former friends is the major source of conversation at Tocco's gym.

"Holyfield has got too much heart to get knocked out in the early rounds," said Tocco.

"You know what everybody does wrong when they fight Tyson? Everybody tries to back him up by rushing in and standing there, right in front of him. Can you believe that? Let me tell you, he'll knock your head off with that overhand right of his.

"You got to keep your left hand up by your chin so he can't counter. And you got to make those lateral moves. You got to move side to side and jab, jab, jab," said Tocco, waving that big cigar.

"And then, maybe, just maybe, you'll get lucky."