THE GREY MATTERS
Forty-six-year-old boxer Jay Corcoran has one goal before he retires Saturday: his first win as a pro
Sunday means sparring at the Ajax Boxing Club, and world-ranked junior middleweight Brandon Cook occupies the ring, putting in rounds ahead of a mid-December card he will headline in Mississauga. Nearby, local professional Jerome Gabriel warms up before his scheduled session with an amateur prepping for an important tournament. But it’s possible none of those fighters has as much at stake this month as Jay Corcoran does.
Corcoran is in a corner of the gym hitting pads with a coach, a bruise beneath his left eye from a mid-week sparring session, his hair the same shade of grey as his T-shirt.
The 46-year-old police officer turned pro in May and is scheduled to fight on Cook’s undercard Dec. 16. He lost his first fight and earned a draw in the rematch. His boxing licence expires Jan. 1 and he doesn’t plan to renew it. After 20 years away from the sport, Corcoran returned to it and turned pro on a whim. Saturday offers his only chance to retire with a win.
“We’re all type-A personalities, in this sport to win,” Corcoran said. “This next week I’m going to push myself beyond what I think I can do. I’ve done three camps in six months. Some guys in their 20s don’t do that.”
Corcoran, who lives in Peterborough, might be closing out his first year in pro boxing, but he’s not a pugilistic rookie. Growing up in Ennismore, Ont., Corcoran spent his adolescence excelling in cross-country running, lacrosse and wrestling. As a hockey player, he reached senior A, and he had stints in Petrolia, Ont., and with his hometown team.
When hockey ended at 22, Corcoran found boxing and quickly developed into a national-class middleweight vying for a slot on the 1998 Commonwealth Games team. Future Olympian Trevor Stewardson made the Games team, and Corcoran moved on to the Toronto Police service, where he has worked since 1998.
At 40, he attended an amateur tournament and his interest in boxing reignited. Five years and two international masters championships later, Corcoran decided to test himself against professionals.
While promoter Tyler Buxton acknowledges the idea of starting a career at 45 sounds outlandish, he points out that amateur and pro boxing offer similar levels of risk.
Corcoran’s pro fights are four rounds instead of amateur boxing’s three, and neither version of the sport uses headgear.
But Buxton said a pro bout offered Corcoran much bigger rewards.
“He might as well . . . mark it off his bucket list,” Buxton said. “There’ll be 4,000 or 5,000 people (in the arena) wishing they had the confidence he has. It takes a lot of courage to get in the ring, and most people don’t have the balls to do it.”
Corcoran debuted on a May card in Peterborough, and lost a four-round split decision to Jason Kelly, a mixed-martial arts journeyman who converted to boxing. Their September rematch ended in a majority-decision draw. One judge had Corcoran winning but was overruled by the two who scored it evenly.
Kelly, a 34-year-old from Napanee, Ont., has five pro boxing matches on his record, and has lost all of them except his two bouts against Corcoran. And like his opponent, Kelly conquered daunting obstacles to start his pro boxing career. Five years ago a back injury suffered during a pickup hockey game left him partially paralyzed for two weeks, and doctors told him to he’d never resume robust physical activity.
Kelly, a personal trainer, endured intense rehab and was cleared to return to boxing last August. He’ll be fighting as a pro for the sixth time in 13 months Saturday.
“What I see in the gym doesn’t show me signs of a 46-year-old man.” MIKE GUYETT JAY CORCORAN’S COACH
Every fight represents another victory over a grim diagnosis, but Saturday is a crucial opportunity for Kelly to vanquish the man he considers his toughest opponent.
“I love the guy. He’s a great, humble guy,” Kelly said. “But if I play it smart, and get it in my head to fight smart, I’ll get my second win. If I fight my fight, I’m going to win.”
If Corcoran wins, the tale of his prevailing against long odds becomes even more triumphant. It would echo Bernard Hopkins, the 46-year-old who became the oldest world champion in boxing history when he defeated Montreal’s Jean Pascal in 2011.
But if Corcoran loses, he could be one more example of the dangers of boxing during middle age. He’d also recall Hopkins, who at age 51 faced 27-year-old Joseph Smith Jr. in a farewell fight, and was driven out of the ring in a knockout loss.
Corcoran’s coach, Mike Guyett, says that even though the fighter trains with the vigour of a man much younger than 46, age factors into how he prepares for fights. He says managing an older fighter’s fatigue means trading volume for quality.
“Sometimes he’s got to remind me that he’s 46, because what I see in the gym doesn’t show me signs of a 46year-old man,” Guyett said. “(But) he doesn’t need to be doing 20 rounds in the gym. It’s a four-round fight. You have to condition yourself to have a high output for four rounds.” Corcoran promises those four rounds will close out his competitive career. He has a job at Toronto Police Service’s 43 Division and plans to open his own gym in Peterborough. He also has a fiancée, four children and a fifth on the way.
But retiring from boxing means leaving a different group of loved ones — coaches, sparring partners, fellow competitors — and a closeness Corcoran’s not sure he can replace.
“You’re nothing without the guys that push you,” he said. “It becomes a family. That’s why it’s been kind of tough, near the end, realizing this is probably going to be my last one.”