Down And Dirty

This story begins, as it must, on the night when Andrew Golota stole another man's pants.

Poor Piotr Bialostocki had no clue when he bumped into Golota on May 12, 1990, at a disco in Wloclawek, Poland, that Golota was a member of the Polish national boxing team or, perhaps more important, that he was the undisputed heavyweight champion of barroom brawls. Bialostocki rather impudently asked the 6'4", 205-pound Golota to move out of his path. Golota denied the request. Fortified by some cocktails, the machinist, who was about half a foot and some 50 pounds smaller than Golota, challenged the similarly inebriated Golota to fight. Bad move, Piotr. After a scene that can only be described as something out of Looney Tunes, Bialostocki found himself wearing only a shiner, his BVDs and one shoe. Golota, accompanied by several boxing buddies, had removed the rest of Bialostocki's wardrobe and deposited the garments outside in the trash. "I didn't want to hurt the guy," Golota says. "I just wanted to make him look silly."

A few months later, facing charges of assault and robbery that could carry a punishment of five years in jail, Golota fled his native Poland and has not returned. So it should have come as little surprise on the evening of July 11 at Madison Square Garden when Golota, well on his way to a stunning upset of Riddick Bowe in the biggest fight of his life, interpreted the rules of boxing in his unique fashion, nailing Bowe at least six times below the belt. Golota was disqualified, sparking a riot that lasted half an hour and injured 22 people.

The headlines above the exultant accounts of the bout in the Polish newspapers the next morning referred to Golota as SCIGANY. The "fugitive." "It's crazy," Golota says. "In Poland today I am a hero, and I am also a wanted man."

A Polish joke. That's how Bowe saw Golota before the bout. But why? Golota hadn't lost any of his previous 28 pro fights, registering 25 knockouts and demonstrating his eagerness to do anything to win. During a March showcase for up-and-coming heavyweights, Golota used a vicious head butt to knock Dannell Nicholson loopy in the fifth round before knocking him out in the eighth. In another bout, against Samson Po'hua in May 1995, Golota struggled until he bit his rival on the neck during a clinch. Po'hua understandably lost his nerve and then the fight in five rounds. "I have to teach Andrew the rules without taking away his hunger," says Golota's trainer, Lou Duva. "Fighting for survival has been the story of his life."

Golota was born in Warsaw on Jan. 5, 1968, the only child of Bozena and Andrzej Golota. His parents split up when he was three, and he was raised primarily by his uncle Zdzisla and aunt Jadwiga in one of Warsaw's most menacing neighborhoods. Golota describes himself in his youth as a bully, thrown out of school regularly, mostly because he was the largest, meanest kid in his class and he possessed a slight stutter, which acted as kindling for dozens of unsanctioned after-school bouts. Recognizing the grit in his 12-year-old nephew, Uncle Zdzisla brought Golota to the Legia Boxing Club, an elite military training center, for some world-class tutoring in the ring. Golota was a pugilistic prodigy. "Most of my family was against my boxing, feeling I should not play such a brutal sport," Golota says. "They were scared that I would get a flat nose."

While building a 111-10 amateur record from 1984 to '90, Golota won a bronze medal in the heavyweight division at the '88 Olympic Games in Seoul. In the summer of '89 Golota traveled to the U.S. for the first time, as a participant in a dual meet between the American and Polish amateur boxing teams. During that trip he met Mariola Babicz, a native of Poland who had lived in Chicago since the age of nine, and they were married in October 1990.

Golota was frustrated in America because he spoke almost no English (a situation that has improved only slightly). He was pondering a career as a truck driver. Then one day at O'Hare Airport he was spotted by a U.S. customs agent, Dick Trindle, who was also a USA Boxing official. Trindle steered him toward Bob O'Donnell's Windy City Gym, and O'Donnell became his manager. Though Golota was initially intimidated by professional boxing, Mariola persuaded him to return to the ring.

Golota earned $50 per round for his early fights, most of which ended in first-round knockouts before boisterous Polish crowds in Chicago. "In the Polish community he is like Rocky, but the Poles don't really understand boxing," says Perzemyslaw Garczarczyk, a Polish journalist who lives in Chicago and has known Golota for six years. "At the beginning they said to Andrew, 'Why not fight Evander Holyfield on Wednesday, then Mike Tyson on Friday, and you will be world champion by the weekend?' "

Golota eventually learned the subtleties of pro boxing by serving as a sparring partner for former heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis. But most experts believed that Golota had bitten off more than even he could chew against Bowe, who was a 10-to-1 favorite.