Lou Duva, the beloved International Boxing Hall of Fame manager and trainer who worked with 19 world titleholders and had about a million stories from his roughly 70 years of involvement in the sport, died on Wednesday of natural causes at a hospital in his hometown of Paterson, New Jersey. He was 94.
Duva was also the patriarch of the boxing family that founded Main Events, which became one of the most dominant promoters of the past 30 years.
Duva's death was announced by his son, Dino Duva, who has been involved in the promotional end of boxing for decades and is an executive with Roc Nation Sports' boxing division.
"The overwhelming number of calls and sympathy wishes from so many friends and associates shows how much our father was loved and respected," he said in a statement. "We sincerely appreciate the support from everyone."
Born on May 28, 1922, in New York City to Italian immigrants before moving to Paterson, Lou Duva was one of boxing's quintessential characters. He became as famous as some of the great fighters he worked with thanks to his tremendous success at the top of boxing, a big personality and resemblance to the cartoon character Barney Rubble.
The roster of boxers Duva helped train and manage included many of the most significant of their time, including Evander Holyfield, Pernell Whitaker, Meldrick Taylor, Mark Breland, Tyrell Biggs, Mike McCallum, Rocky Lockridge, Johnny Bumphus, Livingstone Bramble, Bobby Czyz, Vinny Pazienza, Darrin Van Horn, Michael Moorer, John John Molina, Zab Judah, Vernon Forrest, David Tua and Andrew Golota.
"Lou -- he was tough, man. He was all about the fighters," said trainer Ronnie Shields, a former pro fighter who grew close to Duva as an assistant to him and his late training partner George Benton during a 10-year run with them that began in 1988.
"Lou always came to camp to make sure everyone was taken care of," Shields continued. "Lou made sure we did our job, and when it was time to do something, he showed us how to do it the certain way, the right way."
When promoter Lou DiBella was an HBO Sports executive in the 1990s, he became close to Duva.
"He took a liking to me because I was an Italian kid working at HBO and he knew I loved boxing and he loved to talk boxing. So he was always ridiculously nice to me and became like an uncle to me," DiBella said. "He was a legend in a true sense. He 100 percent was boxing's Yogi Berra. He said some wild things and was a joy to be around. He once said, 'I'll sum up boxing for you in two words: You never know.' He was our Yogi Berra.
"I cried today for Lou and for his family and mostly for us because these characters are one of a kind. They go away and they never come back. Nobody can replace Lou. When I think about Lou he reminds me of when boxing was friendlier, a more fun place.
"Boxing has always had its dark side, but it used to have a lot more camaraderie and lots of characters and you'd laugh your ass off all day, especially with a guy like Lou. It's not like that anymore. Lou loved to be around his family and boxing people, and boxing people were also like his family. I saw Lou more than I saw my own family for a lot of years. Lou was the man."
Duva was introduced to boxing as a 10-year-old by his brother Carl. At age 15, Duva took fights for purses of $5 before dropping out of school to join the Civilian Conservation Corps. During World War II, Duva taught boxing at Camp Hood in Texas and later began promoting boxing cards in his home state of New Jersey, most notably the Joey Giardello-Dick Tiger middleweight world title fight in 1963. Giardello became his first world champion.
In 1978, Dan Duva, Lou's late son, founded Main Events and Lou served as a manager and cornerman for many of the fighters the company promoted. In 1984, Main Events signed several members from the U.S. Olympic team whom Duva and longtime business partner Shelly Finkel managed, including Holyfield, Whitaker and Taylor, three of the biggest stars of the 1990s.
The biggest moment of Duva's career came in October 1990 when Holyfield knocked out James "Buster" Douglas to win the undisputed heavyweight world championship. One of the most disappointing was when Taylor, leading Julio Cesar Chavez Sr. on points going into the 12th round of their epic junior welterweight unification fight in 1990, was infamously stopped with two seconds left, leading to the memorable scene of an angry Duva going berserk at referee Richard Steele after he stopped the fight.
On the 1996 night at New York's Madison Square Garden on which Golota was disqualified in the seventh round of his heavyweight fight against Riddick Bowe, which incited a riot in the arena, Duva suffered a heart problem and was famously carried through the crowd on a stretcher while chaos reigned.
"He could tell stories from the Rocky Marciano days," Shields said. "He used to go watch Rocky Marciano train and he would tell us all about that in camp. He would tell us how Marciano did everything, how he did this, how he did that. It was hard not to like Lou Duva. If Lou was with you, he was with you 100 percent. He would fight for you. He was the type of guy -- if he was with you, he was with you all the way no matter what it was. And Lou never backed down from anybody. He was a feisty guy."
Duva, who was close to Lou Costello of the famed Abbott and Costello comedy team, was voted manager of the year in 1984 by the Boxing Writers Association of America and shared the award with Finkel in 1993. The BWAA also voted him the 1993 winner of the long and meritorious service to boxing award. In 1998, Duva was elected to the International Boxing Hall of Fame.
After Dan Duva -- also a Hall of Famer -- died of brain cancer in 1996, Lou, Dino Duva and daughter Donna Duva Brooks departed Main Events after a falling-out with Dan's widow, Kathy Duva, who still runs the company. They began their own promotional company, Duva Boxing, and Lou continued to train and manage fighters for several years.
Lou Duva, who was predeceased by wife Enes, is survived by son Dino, daughters Donna, Deanne Boorman and Denise Duva, 11 grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.
A viewing will be held from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. on Sunday at Festa Funeral Home in Totowa, New Jersey, with a funeral scheduled for 10 a.m. Monday at St. Mary's Roman Catholic Church in Paterson.