From Hero to Heroin: The Last Days of Tony “El Torito” Ayala Jr.
By Robert Brizel, Head Real Combat Media Boxing Correspondent
Before his release from incarceration a final time, Tony “El Torito” Ayala Jr. pondered the option of a boxing comeback at age 51. Tony had lived and breathed the gym and rings of boxing, and would die on the same pathway on May 15, 2015, at age 52, in the gym, by his own hand. It was a chilling decision a Latino boxer completely misunderstood in his time.
Ayala’s rerelease into society had previously a brief furlough for the funeral of his trainer father Tony Ayala Sr. This tragic occurrence the month before El Torito was released had tragic emotional consequences. His father and his father’s gym were the only reality Tony trusted. Without those two elements, Tony Jr. was a totally lost soul, a forgotten Hispanic hero, who emerged back into society completely lost, never to find himself within himself.
Ayala Jr., 52, was found slumped over early at the Zarzamora Street Gym in San Antonio, Texas. A syringe filled with apparent narcotics and a ball of heroin wrapped in tape were found on a desk inside the gym, with a cooker cap and spoon. Besides Ayala’s corpse, the only signs of trauma had occurred from Ayala’s head striking the floor unconscious. Family members and associates, in a Hector Macho Camacho and Tommy Morrison like bizarre ending, immediately began fighting over the burial rights and the corpse
What about Ayala? Long lost in a profession with no emotional support system, long haunted by his addictions, Ayala chose an emotional exit in a location he felt befitting of his departure. Unable to conquer his emotional demons, unable to function alone in society on his own, El Torito departed this world. El Torito was the champion who never was, an Edwin Valero and Omar Henry boxing figure who had his fleeting moments, only to depart short of greatness. One could only imagine Ayala versus Thomas Hearns, Marvelous Marvin Hagler, Sugar Ray Leonard, GGG, Sergio Gabriel Martinez, Bernard Hopkins, Roy Jones Jr., Gerald McClellan, Julian Jackson, Floyd Mayweather Jr., Paul Williams and Saul Canelo Alvarez at 154 pounds or 160 pounds, in classic 12 round megabout wars.
Tony Ayala’s real war, his most challenging war, was the war he battled within. It is an egotistical war all men face, and one he could not win. Friendless, misunderstood, long forgotten, and totally alone, his past additions haunting him, Ayala made the final decision to end his life by drug overdose on his own terms, in a place and time of his own choosing. Some had tried to understand him. Nobody could. The war within had consumed him, and he had lost to his most dangerous opponent, the one enemy most difficult to confront. Himself. Laid to rest in San Fernando Cemetery III in San Antonio, El Torito rests in peace after a life which was anything but. A few family and friends wore tee-shirts with the gym logo at the service, and waved goodbye. And so it was. Final record 31-2 with 27 knockouts.B
COMMENTS
English