A lot of the taintlessness has left boxing. Fights used to pit the certifiable best in each division against one another, fighters with the very best win-lose records. That changed when Don King came on the scene. Then the sport became as forgone as a rainy Sunday. Suddenly, every fight became a 'champion ship' fight. There were more titles strewn about the sport than Tiger Woods won golf tournaments. Or Bette Davis won Academy Awards. You know, the kind of championships with more writing in front of them than signboard graffiti -- IBF, NABF, UHF, WBA. Guys with undefeated records were facing trial horses who couldn't whip cream. A blind man could see this was an obvious ploy to bolster the record of a pugilist who couldn't even spell legitimate contender, let alone be one. The result was, the title 'champion' didn't command the respect it once did. You should get a free trip to the Bahamas if you could name all the heavyweights who wore bogus championship belts under the bidding of Don King. Don learned it from watching war movies in prison: Who controls the high ground controls the battlefield.

Fights became as lopsided as Russia vs Finland. About as predictable as having lunch with Rocky Marciano. You knew you were going to get stuck with the check but you were hoping for a miracle. Miracles only happen in the movies. In real life, it's the whiskey-drinking, poker-playing, pool-hustling, card-cheating, shirt- chasing-dirt bags who seem to get ahead. Its a familiar litany: good guys finish last.

But all that changed on Saturday, December 2, 2000, the night the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas became the center of global pugilism. Boxing received a pep talk right out of Rockne. The fight game suddenly moved into Ponce de Leon country. John Wayne and the Calvary arrived in time to save the fort. Just when the sport was beginning to wane, it came too life. For once, the paying public wasn't hornswoggled or lied to by Don King's promises of a super-attraction that would end up a super-failure. Felix Trinidad and Ferocious Fernando Vargas promised Leonard-Hearns and they delivered. In spades.

In the first round it looked like Seabiscuit wouldn't make it out of the chute. I thought for a moment that this fight would turn out to be about as exciting as a Mascot serial done on a shoestring budget. However, Mascot was the last stop for cowboy greats and Fernando Vargas was just beginning.

Emerging victorious, Trinidad gave a superlative performance dropping Vargas twice in the first round and three times in the 12th. It was like being locked in a closet with a Doberman pinscher. No one asked for their money back. Trinidad the World Boxing Association super welterweight champion added Vargas's International Boxing Federation junior middleweight belt to his credentials. Vargas got a tremendous break. He lost.

Let me explain. Think of the great fighters that history might have passed over like liver and onions on the menu had they not been annihilated, yet strove determinedly in defeat to win respect as courageous scrappers. Jake LaMotta fought Sugar Ray Robinson so many times he's lucky he didn't get diabetes. But it was their sixth fight in 1951, that gained LaMotta the respect of even Robinson's partisans. "Stop the fight!" implored Sugar's manager George Gainford from his corner midway through the twelfth round. It was that kind of a fight: combinations versus courage. In losing, LaMotta not only maintained his proud record of never having been knocked down, but he left the ring serenaded by a chorus of "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow," amid a standing ovation. A respect he hadn't gotten in his previous 95-fights. They made a movie of his life. On the night of June 25, 1952, Yankee Stadium was hotter than a blowtorch. Or Siberia in mid-afternoon. The heat was so grueling that even referee Ruby Goldstein collapsed before Sugar Ray Robinson did. With an unbeatable lead over the light-heavyweight king, Joey Maxim, and a third world championship virtually within grasp, Sugar melted like Samson before Delilah, and could not answer the fourteen bell. A victim of the heat, and not Maxim's punches, Sugar got all the cheers as he left the ring supported by his handlers. In defeat, he had gained, not only the respect of Maxim, but of sports writers and fans alike who applauded his courage and boxing supremacy.

The laundry list of fighters who gained more respect in losing than they ever did in winning stretches from here to the old days. Tony DeMarco, groggy, hanging on the ropes in a modern-day crucifixion -- yet refusing to surrender to the fusillade of Carmen Basilio; Yvon Durelle's gallant stand against Archie Moore; Joe Frazier's gallant stands against Muhammad Ali and George Foreman gained him more respect than he had gotten in his entire 37 victories. Both Tony Zale and Rocky Graziano were cheered in defeat more than in victory during their seesaw 3-fight series.

In one of the most explosive ring wars ever waged in boxing's glamour division, Ken Norton, although he lost his bid to lift Larry Holmes' crown, was more acclaimed for his gallant stand against Holmes in 1978, than his victory over Muhammad Ali in San Diego. Aficionados to this day, talk about Billy Conn's impressive stand against a proud Joe Louis. Before his 'last hurrah' against Louis, Conn was as unappreciated as Whistler's Father.

In falling under Trinidad's merciless rain of punches, unleashed at superhuman rate, Fearless Fernando gamely fought back like Audie Murphy in Sicily. It is our patriotic duty to recall him in the same breath with LaMotta, Basilio, Durelle, Conn, Walcott and dozens of other memorable combatants who have become the centerpieces of boxing by losing unashamedly to the very best. You don't get brawlers from the monastery. It's a tough man's game. Even Walter Mitty never envisioned becoming a gladiator. Vargas wasn't a good kid while growing up in Oxnard. He had as much charm as a stuck zipper. He had the kind of checkered career that was bound to end up in a striped suit. He credits boxing for saving him from a life in penal servitude.

"I have a lot of friends who didn't make it out of the neighborhood," he said. "I was always in trouble." At age 10 he was the schoolyard bully. To give you an idea, he was so mean he would throw an drowning man both ends of the rope. Even put his pet dog in a sputnik. Suspended from school for fighting, he roamed the streets like a gitano. He saw a local boxing show on TV and decided to give it a try.

It's the age-old question. Is it better to be smarter or younger? God doesn't give it to you both ways. It took time for Vargas to come to terms with God. When he did, the cards fell his way. Older and wiser, Fernando bombed out top-ranked contender Ross Thompson in four heats then set his sights on unifying the IBF and WBA junior middleweight titles. By the time they met, Fernando had run up an unbeaten record of 22 consecutive wins. When he entered the ring, he was as confident as Rommel in a tank. Or Geronimo on horseback. Confidence has a way of inspiring fear in a foe. It had no impact on Trinidad.

Vargas came to fight. Envisioned sending Trinidad into oblivion. Watched some old films of, maybe, Basilio and Sugar Ray. Or Saddler-Pep. His was a valorous effort but no cigar. Trinidad fought like he was double-parked and Vargas went down like Hitler's troops under heavy artillery bombardment. Suddenly the man who had never been knocked off his feet was doing a bandy-legged impression of Charlie Chaplin, wobbling around the ring like Robert Downey Jr. in a cocaine haze.

Roger Bloodworth, Vargas' assistant trainer said after the fight, " Fernando Vargas will be back. He's a warrior. I have no shame. I don't feel bad. We are ready to do it again. I asked him if he wanted a rematch. He said, 'Absolutely, yes.'"

Vargas grew up wanting to be like Carlos Monzon, middleweight champion from Argentina during the 1970s. Monzon, you will remember, fought everybody and retired in 1977 when there was nobody left to fight. His knockouts included Nino Benvenuti, Emile Griffith, Jose Napols and Tony Licata.

"I want to be like him, Vargas said. " I want to retire when I feel I beat everybody."

One thing in Vargas' favor is the fact that he'd rather fight than eat. The same couldn't have been said for Buster Douglas, George Foreman or Riddick Bowe. Even if they didn't pay Fernando he says he would be fighting. With this kind of thinking John Hart made over 53 Lone Ranger chapters on television.

Before the fight Vargas had confidence that nobody on earth could beat him. John L. Sullivan had it. Jack Dempsey had it. Rocky Marciano had it. Mike Tyson said it often enough. The great fighters have it. They should build a wing on Boxing's Hall of Fame for guys like this. They are as precious as the Kohinoor diamond. The Nevada Athletic Commission and the metropolitan press praised Vargas in defeat for helping boxing make a comeback from near oblivion. Without Vargas's brave performance, boxing might have descended into hippodrome of fate. Vanished quicker than a letter address to "Occupant."

Nevada commission executive director Marc Ratner told reporters, "There will be no negatives about this fight. It was wonderful for the sport. I am thrilled for the sport." Mike Tyson made the mistake of underestimating Buster Douglas. Dempsey failed to go to a neutral corner after dropping Gene Tunney for 14.5 seconds, thereby losing his bid to regain his title. Trinidad joined the ranks of the 'mistakees' when he failed to finish Vargas off after flooring him twice in the first round. One of the game's best finishers, he strangely enough let Vargas off the hook and Vargas came back to deck him in the fourth round with a left hook.

"I thought the fight would be over quick," Trindad said. "You have to give credit to his stamina, his conditioning. That's why he lasted. It surprised me, but he came with good conditioning. But with my conditioning, I knew even if it took 12, I would win." Vargas said he wasn't afraid to get into a slugfest with the skinny, powerful Puerto Rican, who racked up his 32nd knockout in 39 wins. But Trinidad did more than drop him, he befuddled him. Felix was on him like an injured tiger, hooking, slugging, crossing, left-right, right-left --every punch landing on Fernando's head, causing him to stagger and 10,627 souls to scream out of the cheap seats for the kill.

Bruised and puffy eyes usually accompanies the great duels. Carmen Basilio's left eye looked like a purple balloon after Sugar Robinson thumbed him. Tony Galento's face resembled spaghetti with clam sauce after Joe Louis stopped him. Vargas' face bore similar wounds, but that's not what he said lost the fight for him. "My private parts are bruised, still," he tells you. "I got hit low three times, very severely and that definitely took a lot out of me. I had no legs. I'm bruised now there as we speak. When I knocked him down in the fourth I thought it was close to the end there, and that's when he hit me in the groin."

Does Vargas want a rematch? Does a bridesmaid want to catch the bouquet? Does every racehorse owner dream of winning the Kentucky Derby and its Triple Crown satellites? "Next time, things will be different," Vargas says. But will there be a next time? Promoter Don King seems to be leaning toward having Trinidad fight World Boxing Association middleweight champ William Joppy. Vargas' people have advised him not to move up to the middleweight division merely to chase Trinidad, who is expected to vacate the WBA super welterweight Federation junior middleweight crown he won from Vargas.

The question now is, will Vagas be able to maintain his boxing supremacy after suffering a bad beating. Most fighters, I may point out, are never the same. Examples: After Bob Montogomery's knockout defeat at the hands of Ike Williams in 1947, the 'Bobcat' fought six more times without winning, then retired. Tony Zale's three wars with Rocky Graziano took its effect and after stopping Graziano for the last time, he was knocked out by Marcel Cerdan in 1948, then retired. He told me, "I had nothing left."

Still not convinced? Okay, Gene Fullmer retired in 1964 after taking a beating from Dick Tiger. Jake LaMotta's last fight with Sugar Robinson took it's toll and Irish Bob Murphy stopped him in his next fight. Jake decided to hang 'um up after losing a decision to Billy Kilgore in 1954. The list goes on and on and includes Marvelous Marvin Hagler's retirement after being beaten by Sugar Ray Leonard. It is not only love that conquers all. Rib-crackers and head punches can do it.

"I'm not concerned about all that," strong-willed Vargas tells you. I had never been knocked down, but I got knocked down. I got up and showed the world what I'm all about. I look forward to keeping on doing what I'm doing."

And so do we Fernando. You are always welcome to this writer's living room. ***

A Bit About Bill Kelly