"Your boxing education is lacking," I was told. This came after the recent death of W.C. Heinz, an apparently legendary sportswriter of whom I had never heard. Heinz’s best known work, "Death of a Racehorse," can be found on Google Books and elsewhere on the web, and is one of the best pieces of short non-fiction I have ever read.

A selection of some of his sportswriting, What a Time It Was: The Best of W. C. Heinz on Sports, is available on Google Books and you can read portions of many of the stories, such as those about Al "Bummy" Davis in the "Brownsville Bum," Sugar Ray Robinson in "The Greatest Pound for Pound," and manager Jack Hurly in "So Long, Jack."

Heinz covers fighters’ characters as much, if not more, than their ring exploits. I dare you to read his Floyd Patterson story and not wonder what Cus D’Amato must have thought of Floyd Patterson compared to Mike Tyson.

Looks like he was right, my boxing education was lacking.