كاس داماتو

Mike Tyson came out of a reform school. So did another boy.

Before they turned 22, both were heavyweight champion of the world, and both came through one man's door.

So what did their teacher see in them?

At 12, Cus D'Amato made a grown bully run. But the fight blinded one eye for years, so he could never turn professional.

Instead, he ran a gym up a dark stairway, teaching boys for free. Many tough kids froze at the door at the top.

"First thing I want to know about a kid," Cus said, "is whether he can open that door."

A shy 14-year-old, once sent to a reform school, opened it: Floyd Patterson.

Boxing's bosses, backed by the mob, wanted a share of Floyd's money. Cus said no.

Before the title fight, Cus slept across Floyd's door, in case the mob tried something.

At 21, Floyd became the youngest heavyweight champion ever.

But fighting the mob left Cus with no money, and then Floyd left him.

Floyd said Cus tried to control him. For a month, Cus said, he banged on Floyd's door almost every day. It never opened.

He started over in a small town, above the police station. At 72, a reform-school counsellor brought him a 13-year-old.

The boy sparred until his nose bled, and wouldn't stop.

The counsellor said Cus told him: "That is the heavyweight champion of the world, and possibly the universe." The boy cried. It was Mike Tyson.

Cus took him in, and when the boy's mother died, became his guardian.

For this boy, Cus held every door open. A trainer said Cus even hid the boy's trouble at school.

Cus died at 77. Tyson was 19, and unbeaten.

A year later, at 20, Tyson broke Floyd's record, and dedicated the fight "to my great guardian, Cus D'Amato."

Twice, Cus saw a champion in a shy boy at his door. He lived to see it once.