This Lady’s A Real Knockout King Protege Leads The Way As Women’s Boxing Grows

She is talented, attractive and making a living wage in a field in which almost everyone else is scrambling to break even.

Little wonder that Christy Martin, the reluctant heroine of women’s boxing, continues to be the gold standard against which an increasing number of female fighters measure themselves.

Theirs is a small revolution, but it is a revolution nonetheless. Battles are being waged and won in venues ranging from the musty Blue Horizon in Philadelphia to the magnificent MGM Grand in Las Vegas, where Martin (35-2-2, 25 KOs), a lightweight, was scheduled to take on Melinda Robinson (4-4, 2 KOs) Saturday night on the undercard of a pay-per-view card headlined by Mike Tyson’s challenge of WBA heavyweight champion Bruce Seldon.

“I had no idea there were women boxers until I saw Christy Martin on TV,” said Maria Stasio, 28, a West Philadelphia resident who will make her amateur boxing debut later this month. “I really envy her. She’s like an idol to women like me, who want to be in boxing. She showed that there is a place in the sport for us. You just have to want it bad enough.”

Martin, 27, is not the first woman to make a splash in a sport that traditionally has been the most hidebound of male preserves, nor is she beyond dispute the best. But no other female fighter has what she has: the power and privilege that come with a high-profile promoter (Don King), exposure on Showtime and PPV cards featuring Tyson, guest shots on “Today” and David Letterman’s show, the cover of Sports Illustrated and the possibility of lucrative endorsement contracts.

“Christy’s ability is what counts,” King said when asked about the unique position Martin holds among high-visibility American athletes. “But I do have to say I’m shocked a lady as beautiful as she would even want to get into this business.”

Make no mistake, King signed the “Coal Miner’s Daughter” to a four-year promotional contract as much for her good looks as for her left hooks.

Gymnasiums throughout the country are reporting a sharp increase in the number of women training as boxers - and most of the new devotees, to one extent or another, see themselves as the “next Christy Martin.”

“Boxing training is an unbelievable aerobic activity, although I don’t necessarily believe boxing is for everyone,” Joy Waller, 22, a Delaware County aerobics instructor whose ring experience has been limited to one Tough Woman bout, said after a recent workout with noted trainer Marty Feldman. “There’s a big difference between punching the heavy bag and actually competing. But, yeah, I’ve thought about what it would be like to fight Christy Martin. I’d like to think I could hold my own against her. If she can do it, I don’t see why I can’t.”

Such visions explain the gravitation toward boxing of strong-minded women, who believe nothing men possess is or should be beyond their grasp. But guys are buying into the premise, too. On Aug. 20, USA Network’s weekly boxing series, “USA Tuesday Night Fights,” the audience for which is heavily male, conducted a poll in which viewers were given a toll-free number and asked if they wanted to see more women’s boxing on the cable network.

The poll was run on an evening in which Martin provided guest commentary for a sixround women’s bout at The Theater in Madison Square Garden involving super-welterweights Kathy Collins and Andrea DeShong. An amazing 81 percent of the 64,883 respondents (52,464) indicated an interest in seeing more women’s boxing following Collins’ action-packed, unanimous decision over DeShong, who had defeated Martin in two of three matchups.

“We are impressed by the interest in women’s boxing that these poll numbers clearly reflect,” said Gordon Beck, USA’s vice president for sports and production.

Added USA blow-by-blow announcer Al Albert: “The women’s bout stole the show and, quite frankly, the men’s bouts were very lackluster. As a matter of fact, the next time we’re on the air, we’re going to poll our viewers again, asking them if they want to see more men’s boxing on USA.”

Boxing has long used sex appeal to sell its product, but scantily clad women holding round cards are not as involved as a pink-clad boxer who can knock out opponents in the ring and be a miniskirted knockout at the postfight news conference.

“I hate to give any credit to Don King, but he pushed Christy as sort of a gimmick and she hit big,” rival promoter Don Elbaum said. “At least I think he looked on it as a gimmick; that’s just the way Don is. But whatever he was thinking, all of a sudden it caught on.

“Butterbean (the 320-pound, no-talent heavyweight who has developed a cult following) is supposed to be a joke, right? But he caught on, too.

“Look, Christy Martin is a great ambassador for women’s boxing. I’m not sure it would have taken off the way it did if it wasn’t for her, or someone like her.”

Elbaum, who said he was once “very anti-women’s boxing,” allowed himself to be converted after an old friend, Fred Burns, sent him a tape of a 6-2 former Murray State basketball player named Jen Childers.

“Fred said this girl had just won the Indiana Golden Gloves, that she was gorgeous, like a Cindy Crawford,” Elbaum said. “To be honest, the tape I saw didn’t impress me that much. I did like the fact that she had a very good jab. It wasn’t a powerhouse jab, but it shot straight out and came right back.”

Childers, like everyone else, pays homage to Martin and the trail she is blazing.

“Whenever people find out I’m a boxer, they ask if I know Christy Martin,” said Childers, a middleweight who is 3-0 as a pro. “The thing about Christy is that she looks like a woman and fights like a man. She always puts on an entertaining show. She gives the rest of us something to shoot for.”

“We are living in an age of feminism,” acknowledged Larry Hazzard, who has approved a number of female bouts as head of the New Jersey State Athletic Control Board. “Women have combat roles in the military, they’re street cops, they’re construction workers. There aren’t many fields from which they’re prohibited, and that’s probably as it should be. The days of women being over here and men over there are done. I’m all for equality of the sexes.”

If only Martin herself shared Hazzard’s unisex vision of the modern workplace. Maybe the most remarkable thing about her emergence is that she is conservative. Oh, she is quite capable of transforming herself into a Tysonesque destroyer on fight night, but beneath it all beats the heart of a June Cleaver wannabe.

“At some point, before too long, I’m going to want to stop doing this and have a family,” Martin said. “Until then, I’m just trying to do the best I can for myself.

“People find this hard to believe, considering what I do, but I’m not a proponent of women firefighters or women policemen. I’m not sure I’m even that big a proponent of women boxers. I’m not trying to make a statement. All I’m doing is trying to promote Christy Martin.”