Respected trainer claims ex-promoters block comeback bout
These days, ex-IBF lightweight title holder Paul Spadafora is living in Florida at a sober-living treatment facility and he’s training for a comeback with Buddy McGirt. Tonight (June 1st), Spadafora was to have his first fight back after a nearly 18-month layoff against journeyman Wilfredo Negron of Puerto Rico. Spadafora’s former trainer and sparring partner Tom Yankello remains on good terms with the boxer and was going to work his corner tonight because McGirt is with Antonio Tarver in California for a bigger fight
Yankello is under the impression that the contract in question with Paul will expire on the 15th of June, and when it does, Yankello believes Spadafora will be free to continue his career under Lynch’s guidance. “I think Pat Lynch is a great manager and if he can do what he did with Arturo (Gatti) and get Paul some good fights, I think he can make another splash,” said the optimistic Yankello. “If he can keep himself clean because that's always been the issue,” said Yankello, a reference to Spadafora’s well-documented substance abuse problems
Yankello and Spadafora met in Ambridge, Pennsylvania, a blue collar working class town about 18 miles from Pittsburgh. It is also the home of Yankello's World Class Boxing Gym, located on the third floor of a nondescript brick building on 8th Street. Yankello's gym looks and sounds like something out of a Hollywood movie, with boxing posters adorning the walls from both past and upcoming bouts, the sound of punching bags being hit, and rope being skipped. The gym is home to a crosssection of fighters that on any given afternoon range from future Hall of Famer Roy Jones Jr. to kids who have yet to have their first amateur fight.
Yankello himself never got to live his dream of being a professional boxer when his amateur career was cut short by multiple shoulder surgeries. Although he could no longer box himself, Tom stayed involved with the sport he first took up at the age of 7.
In 1992 at the age of 21 he started training fighters in the sport he loved. “My dad's a school teacher so I think I got the teaching gene from him,” said Yankello.
“It was a difficult transition, but it made me more in tune as far as teaching somebody because my respect had to come from what I was doing. It wasn't going to be from my age experience or even somewhat from my boxing because I never had no pro experience,” he said about going from fighter to trainer at such a young age.
When Spadafora's original trainer Charles "P.K." Pecora suffered a stroke in 1996, Yankello stepped in to help out for a few fights. When Pecora passed away in 1997 after another stoke, it was a natural fit for Yankello to take over the as the full time trainer for his former sparring partner.
With only seven years of training under his belt at the age of 28, Tom had his first world champion in 1999 when Paul "The Pittsburgh Kid” Spadafora won the vacant IBF lightweight title. “I used to box with him and spar with him so we built a relationship with that. Then when I started training fighters I started taking my fighters down to spar with him,” said Yankello about the start of his professional relationship with the Pittsburgh Kid.
Spadafora's management thought that Yankello, at 28, didn't have the necessary experience to train the newly crowned champion on his own so they brought in veteran trainer Jesse Reid to help co-train. “I trained him until he was 27-0 and won the title,” said Yankello. “When we won the title is when they (Spadafora's management team) pulled that thing on me, they brought in Jesse Reid."
But Spadafora stayed loyal to his friend. "They brought in Pat Burns and tried to have him train with all these other guys but he (Spadafora) just kept on sticking to his guns. He just felt more comfortable with me. He had a good relationship with me and he liked the way I trained him and liked the things I worked on with him.”
Yankello's relationship with promoter Mike Acri and manager Al McCauley was a tumultuous one, “They didn't respect me, the fighters respected me, but they didn't respect me because of my inexperience and my age,” said a still-annoyed Yankello. “If someone doesn't respect you, you have a hard time respecting them back.”
Eventually Spadafora's management got its wish and Spadafora cut ties with the man who took him to the title. In his two fights without Yankello holding the reigns, Spadafora, who is undefeated to this day, had arguably the worst outings of his career, wins against Victoriano Sosa and Mike Griffith. After those close calls, Yankello was brought back in as co-trainer.
Together, the team of Yankello and Reid guided Paul to six more wins before getting a draw in a unification bout against WBA title holder Leonard Dorin. After the bout, there was talk of a rematch but it never happened.
Yankello and a partner formed World Class Boxing Promotions and signed an exclusive deal with Mountaineer Casino Racetrack and Resort to host boxing promotions for his fighter Verquan Kimbrough. Mike Acri who had promoted a number of shows there was infuriated according to Tom. “He felt like I stepped on his territory as a promoter,” Yankello said.
“He threatened Paul and told him you aren't training with Tommy Yankello no more,” Yankello claimed. “I am not going to get you no more fights, (if Paul continued working with Tom). I am going to blackball you from the sport.”
“They basically just strong armed this kid and made him do whatever the hell they wanted to do. He didn't have anyone else telling him different,” Yankello said of Paul.
Before long Paul dropped both Yankello and Reid. ”They made him talk to a newspaper writer and tell him that he's getting rid of me and Jesse Reid both because we couldn't get along,” Yankello said. He admitted that his relationship with Reid was not the best, but added that “they had to get rid of both of us to not make it so obvious that they were just trying to get rid of me.”
Paul went to train with Hall of Fame trainer Emanuel Steward although his time at the Kronk Gym in Detroit would not last long. Being in Detroit was not what Paul wanted and he soon called his former trainer,” He tells me I can't stand it up here in Detroit, I want to come home,” recalled Yankello. According to Yankello, Spadafora pleaded with him to help him get out of the contract with Acri.
Within days of the call Spadafora brought a copy of his contract to Yankello and he took it to an attorney to review. According to Yankello the attorney told him that contract was filled with loopholes and that they should be able to get Paul out his contract.
“I called Paul and said the guy wants to meet with you tomorrow but Paul never shows up,” Yankello recalled. He had no idea what had happened, but said he later learned that Spadafora had allegedly been forced by his managers to go to an out-of-town training camp before he could meet with the attorney Yankello had found.
Then Spadafora’s personal problems took control. The boxer had a friend come pick him up, but “that night (a Thursday) Paul was arrested for public urination,” Yankello said. After being bailed out by his management team and sent back to camp, Spadafora then became angry again, left the training facility on Saturday and ended up in Pittsburgh where he got drunk and high, Yankello said. Early that Sunday morning Spadafora shot his pregnant girlfriend and eventually was charged with attempted murder.
Spadafora pleaded guilty to a lesser charge and served only 13 months. Since his release from prison, he has continued to have problems with the law and has never been able to get his boxing career back in full swing. His last fight was in November 2010.
In October and November of 2011, more than seven years after the Dorin fight, Spadafora was once again training at Yankello's World Class Boxing Gym. “He might have three or four good years left,” Yankello said in reference to a return to boxing for the troubled Pittsburgh fighter. “I had him in the gym before he left for Florida and he wasn't clean or healthy, but damn did the son of a gun look good.”
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