15-Round Fights and a Good Right Hand: Jackie Holley’s Fleeting 1984 Title Reign

 

Jackie Holley had just done the improbable and KO’d Sue ‘KO’ Carlson to win the IWBA world lightweight title. Improbable to some, maybe. But not to Holley’s supporters. And certainly not to her.

Both hands thrown in the air, Holley was hoisted onto the shoulders of Jim Waldrop, her trainer and manager, and Ricky Rogers, a rookie featherweight who served as Jackie’s cornerman and sparring partner. A few moments after her feet touched back onto the canvas, the triumphant Floridian grabbed hold of the ring announcer’s microphone to address the hometown crowd assembled inside the Municipal Auditorium for her “Yo, Adrian, I did it!” moment. “I’ve been working for this for four years,” Holley said once she gained her composure. “I have brought a world championship to Pensacola!”  

It would be another nine years before Pensacola produced another world boxing champion—none other than future pound-for-pound hall of famer Roy Jones Jr., who, at the time Jackie Holley won her title, had just dashed out of the gate for what would be an ultimately successful run at the 1984 Junior Olympics in the 119-pound division. Jones was born and raised in Pensacola whereas Holley was a recent transplant from Detroit—the stomping ground of Joe Louis, Sugar Ray Robinson, and Thomas Hearns to name a few—where she was first introduced to the rudiments of fighting thanks to regular tussles with her siblings.

“You know how brothers and sisters are. I’ve got seven brothers and only two are younger,” said Jackie. “We used to fight a lot, usually Friday nights. But it wasn’t anything serious. In fact, I’ve maybe had two fights in junior high school and that’s it…until I got into the martial arts.” Holley was a natural when it came to athletics and you would be hard pressed to think of a sport she wasn’t good at. Basketball, softball, volleyball, touch football, tennis, racquetball, and field hockey. Jackie excelled at them all before turning her attention to more rough and tumble pastimes like karate and kickboxing after relocating to Pensacola.

“I love sports and I’ve always wanted to do something to make a name for myself in sports,” said Holley. “Just like when I was a little girl and I had it in my mind that I wanted to grow up and be a policewoman.” Graduating from the police academy near the top of her class, Jackie patrolled the mean streets of Detroit and performed a wide array of law enforcement duties. “Scout car, surveillance, accident prevention, even a little narcotics,” Holley said, listing her various responsibilities. Over time, both the job and the city wore her down and Jackie sought a change of scenery to give her a new lease on life.

“It was getting pretty rough in Detroit in 1980 with the unemployment so high and I was 160 pounds of pure nerve-endings. No, I don’t miss it. The work was not gratifying at all,” she said retrospectively. “When I was growing up, I thought Detroit was the best thing going. Motown, the Motor City, clubs, plenty to do, sports. But I wouldn’t go back to live. Why put your children through that aggravation?”

Within a year of moving to Pensacola, Holley had earned a brown belt in Taekwondo and placed first in four regional tournaments, winning half of her ten individual contests and getting disqualified on technicalities in the other five. “I feel like I got a bad deal in those other five fights. They said I hit too hard,” Holley griped. “But if those women can’t take the blows then they shouldn’t be out there. I mean, whenever you are fighting, whether it’s in competition or not, you should still perform your best.”

Despite her daily nine-to-ten-hour training regimen, which consisted of martial arts practice, running three miles, skipping rope, and intense stretching exercises, Jackie somehow made time to teach beginner and advanced classes at the Motley Karate School. She landed a job as a security officer at the Pensacola Naval Air Station while spending three years pursuing a rematch with kickboxing rival and legendary Hollywood stuntwoman in the making Cheryl Wheeler, the two having battled to an attention-getting majority draw three years earlier. “She has more to lose than I do,” said Holley. “I have nothing to lose, and I feel I am a better fighter than she is.”

By the end of 1983, Jackie had transitioned to boxing and was referred to IWBA founder and promoter Vern Stevenson by Pensacola matchmaker Tommy Hatcher as a potential challenger for the lightweight championship. They hammered out an agreement whereby Holley would be guaranteed a shot at the title in her hometown if she could win an elimination bout against Stevenson’s protégé, Lanay Browning. That fight would also occur in Pensacola, on December 15, 1983 at the Municipal Auditorium.

“I hate the term lady boxer,” said Browning, a corrections officer and the reigning Canadian lightweight champion, who thus far had been unable to fight in her home province of Ontario where women were banned from the prize ring, although the wheels were in motion to overturn the ruling. “I’m a boxer, period. I’m out there hitting the bag. I see myself as a boxer in the ring. Outside the ring, I’m a woman.” Competing since the age of 13, Browning welcomed the physical challenges that boxing presented but also the opportunity to dispel sexist misconceptions. “Most of them come expecting to see mud wrestling, but if you get two top women boxers together, it’s even better than watching the men,” she theorized. “Women are more graceful, have more style, and use their heads a lot more than men do. Most of the men are always looking for that one big punch to knock someone out. We have to dance and use our combinations to set up punches. It is more scientific.”

It routinely took time for Browning to get her motor running after the opening bell as it was and Holley, who was comfortable fighting with either foot out front, made it an even tougher uphill climb for the Canadian by coming out of her corner in a southpaw stance. “I really hadn’t expected it,” Browning later admitted. She spent the first four rounds pawing at Holley with a constant but noncommittal jab and following it up with the occasional looping left hand with the hope of eventually closing the distance where she was known to do her best work. Holley, meanwhile, was allowed to familiarize herself with Browning’s rhythm, get her own timing down, and wait for the opportune time to pounce.

That opening presented itself in the fifth round. Holley feinted with her right hand and unleashed a left that caught Browning with her guard down and knocked her through the ropes. “That one, I felt like she kind of ran into it,” Jackie said after the fight. “I knew she was an inside fighter, but when we got inside I just sort of put my combinations together and went for it.”

Browning climbed back into the ring and beat the count, later claiming to have been more surprised than hurt or even stunned. Indeed, she pursued Holley around the ring with a sense of urgency in the sixth round but was kept at arm’s length by Jackie’s jab and deft footwork. Holley began the seventh by connecting with two consecutive head shots and retreating out of harm’s way before concentrating her attack on Browning’s body. Backing her opponent into the ropes with a left/right combination, Holley advanced to deliver what turned out to be the coup de grace, a trio of blows to the midsection that forced Browning to her knees, doubled over with her forehead pressed against the canvas, cradling her abdomen in obvious physical distress. Browning struggled to her feet at the count of nine but was in no condition to return to combat, remaining on her stool at the commencement of round eight which gave Jackie Holley the victory by technical knockout. “She caught me with three really good punches almost consecutively to the belly,” Browning said back in the locker room. “The last one was a good right hand.”           

(Browning Doubled Over on Canvas From Holley Body Shot)

Holley’s good right hand would be the decision-maker in her next fight too. February 17, 1984 was the date circled on the calendar to mark the IWBA world lightweight championship showdown between Holley and Sue ‘KO’ Carlson, a mere two months off from Jackie’s win over Browning in their title eliminator. Not only that, but it was announced that the fight would be a 15-rounder. This was uncommon ground for women’s boxing, a trail that had been freshly blazed a little more than three and a half years prior when Carlson knocked out Tammy Jensen in the third of fifteen scheduled rounds in September 1981 in defense of her WWBA super-lightweight title.

The second and most recent occurrence was on October 21, 1983 when Darlina Valdez outpointed Holly McDaniel over an unprecedented fifteen 3-minute rounds to win the IWBA super-bantamweight title. In fact, some newspaper accounts leading up to the Jackie Holley/Lanay Browning title eliminator reported erroneously that they were vying for the chance to square off against Valdez.            

Sue Carlson, now the top-ranked IWBA contender, had previously held the WWBA version of the 135-pound world championship before losing it to Lady Tyger in March 1979 and was looking to reestablish her dominance in the division she reigned over not long ago by beating the #2-rated Jackie Holley in her own backyard. The 26-year-old Carlson was born in Brainerd, Minnesota (“Home of Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox,” as Marge Gunderson reminds us—and a very nervous Jerry Lundergaard—in Fargo) and was brought up with seven siblings just like Jackie Holley. An aspiring writer, Sue enrolled at the University of Minnesota to major in journalism and helped pay her tuition by waiting tables at a nearby diner where she met former Air Force heavyweight champion Bill Paul, who was putting together a women’s boxing program at the University. It took some persistence on Paul’s part, but he managed to convince Sue to make the switch from writer to fighter. Carlson was still in the food service industry, having worked her way up to chef in a Minneapolis restaurant, and was hopeful that she could cook up something special in Pensacola on February 17.

“I’m thirsty,” said ‘KO’ Carlson ahead of her matchup against Jackie Holley. “I want my title back and I’m in the best physical condition in four years. I’d say the fight will go ten (rounds) at the most. I’ve just got this feeling that it won’t go the distance,” she predicted in accordance with her ring moniker. She was right too. Just not the way she envisioned it. “I’m in the best shape of my life. I have been going 15 rounds a day, five days a week against some strong male sparring partners. My agent knows about her (Holley) and he thinks it will be a darn good fight. I know she likes to switch back and forth during a fight, going from orthodox to southpaw. I don’t think that will bother me though.”  

Jackie Holley got to size up Carlson at the weigh-in, assessing, “I was expecting somebody bigger. I respect the fact she’s had nine knockouts. I know she has power in her left hand. But I too have the ability to knock out somebody. But I won’t be looking for it,” she continued. “If the combinations are right then maybe it will happen. I know I can take a punch so she’ll have to have a lulu to stop me.”

With the fight starting out at a tentative pace over the first two rounds, Carlson didn’t test Holley’s chin with anything significant and Jackie was likewise content to feel her opponent out with a series of range finding jabs. Fifteen rounds, after all, was a long way to go. A marathon, not a sprint, as they say. No need to force the issue and get reckless or burn out too fast. Holley was the first to take the initiative, connecting with a one/two at the beginning of the third round that rattled Carlson, even if only momentarily. That was all Holley needed, and she settled into a comfort zone after taking the measure of the former world champion and finding the results favorable. Carlson applied a little more pressure in round four, landing a few powerful lefts during toe to toe exchanges. Holley shook them off with relative ease and ended the fourth with a straight right that caused Carlson to examine the arena lights overhead for a split second as her head snapped back with the force of the blow.

“After that fourth round I knew she was kind of hurt,” said Holley when all was said and done. “I noticed she seemed to be getting tired and had started breathing through her mouth.” Holley pressed the advantage in round five and deposited Carlson onto the canvas for a nine count with another right hand. Despite sensing the end was near, Holley had the presence of mind not to throw caution to the wind, especially against a renowned puncher. “She was like a hurt animal backed into a corner,” Holley said later. “I got the feeling she was telling me, ‘C’mon, what I got left I got to put on you now.’ So I didn’t want to wade in there and get hit with something.”

That said, Holley also knew that allowing Carlson time to recover was not a wise move either and came out swinging in the opening moments of the sixth. She put Carlson on the backfoot with a hailstorm of combinations and stalked her wounded prey across the ring. Carlson planted her feet and unleashed a Hail Mary left hook intended for her pursuer. Holley saw it coming from a mile away, effortlessly ducked the blow, and finished off Carlson with a lead left followed by her good right hand. “I’d noticed that earlier when she threw that punch. It was slow and, well, almost a roundhouse punch,” the new world champion told the press in her locker room. “I just filed it away for the next time.”

Carlson was magnanimous in defeat, confessing, “I got hit good a few times. She was very quick and she’s very good. She deserves the title.”

With her manager’s blessing, Jackie Holley planned to take a well-deserved month off before entering into preparation for her first title defense. “I’ve waited four years for this,” she said. “I’m going to enjoy it and then we’ll take ‘em one at a time.” Little did Holley know her championship reign would amount to one and done. One half of a set of prizefighting identical twins, who went by the nickname “Little Dempsey” due to her incessant pressure-cooker style of boxing, would make sure of that.

Three years after her sister Cora had left Florida and taken up residence in Los Angeles, where she quickly became a known quantity on the flourishing women’s boxing scene, Dora Webber followed her twin out west and into the prize ring. Dora put an exclamation point on her 1983 pro debut by scoring a second-round TKO over former world champion Toni Lear Rodriguez, who Cora had gone the distance with four years earlier. Talk about sibling rivalry.

Dora Webber had only one gear, and that was grinding forward at breakneck speed. Jackie Holley would find that out the hard way. Holley put her title on the line against the fourth-ranked Webber on February 24, 1984 in her third consecutive fight at the Pensacola Municipal Auditorium. Like her championship-winning effort against Sue Carlson six months before, Holley’s maiden defense was also scheduled for fifteen rounds. Only this time, Jackie Holley and Dora Webber would both cross the finish line. An endurance test. A Darwinian gut check. The ultimate survival of the fittest.   

“I felt I was in control from the beginning,” Webber said after her dominant performance. From the first bell to the last, she left little doubt at any point about the fact that the IWBA world lightweight title would change hands yet again when the decision was announced. “I was worried about getting tired, so I picked my shots. I wanted to relax. I didn’t want to run out of gas,” said Webber. “I just wanted to take it to her. I didn’t want to knock her out because of her experience. I kept my hands up.”

Holley’s plan to start the fight by boxing from the outside behind her jab was eradicated immediately by Webber’s stifling offense, a barrage of left hooks and overhand rights that forced the defending champion to improvise adapt or perish tactics from the get-go. Late in the second round, Holley connected with her good right hand but it just wasn’t good enough on that night. Dora walked right through it and kept coming straight ahead like a monster from one of those slasher flicks.

“I was slipping her punches and hitting her with some good body punches,” said Webber. “No one can take my cannon body shots.” To Holley’s credit, she didn’t wither under the onslaught. In fact, she countered with well-timed combinations multiple times throughout the fight. But Webber refused to tire or relent. If anything, her stamina seemed to improve as the contest wore on.

“She never hurt me,” Holley insisted, protesting that Webber was guilty of holding and hitting while in the referee’s blind spot. “It may have looked like she did. She gave me some good body shots but they weren’t clean.” Stuck in neutral, perpetually fighting with her back to the ropes, there wasn’t a whole lot Jackie could do except finish the fight on her feet and relinquish her title with her dignity intact. Both of which she did. Like a true champion. A short-term champion, yes. But a champion nevertheless. A world champion from Pensacola with a good right hand.          

 

Sources:

Sharon Moultry. On Her Way to the Top (Pensacola News, July 15, 1981)

Jeff Hand. Thrilla in Pensacola Bout Promises Big Action (Pensacola News, June 16, 1983)

Women Highlight Armory Boxing Card (Pensacola News-Journal, December 4, 1983)

Jeff Hand. Lanay Browning Breaks Boxers Mold (Pensacola News, December 14, 1983)

Jeff Hand. Browning Pales in Holley Attack (Pensacola News, December 16, 1983)

Pensacola Woman Eyes Boxing Title (Pensacola News-Journal, February 12, 1984)

Jeff Hand. Jack od All Trades Holley Fighting for More Than Survival Friday Night (Pensacola News, February 15, 1984)

Junior Ingram. Women Eye Ring Crown (Pensacola News-Journal, February 17, 1984)

Jeff Hand. Holley, Carlson Crave Victory (Pensacola News, February 17, 1984)

Junior Ingram. Pensacola’s Holley Wins World Boxing Championship (Pensacola News-Journal, February 18, 1984)

Jeff Hand. Holley Wears the Crown (Pensacola News, February 20, 1984)

David Hutchinson. Webber Stops Holley, Wins IWBA Crown (Pensacola News-Journal, August 25, 1984)

Sue Fox. Pioneer Female Boxer: Sue “KO” Carlson (WBAN Historical Database)