You never forget your first boxing coach. The man who teaches you how to take and throw a punch. In the fight game, getting clocked in the face for the first time is akin to losing your virginity. Until then you’re flinchy and inexperienced. For Ralph Jones that man was Andy “Sandman” Lane.
Little Ralph had a bully problem growing up. So desperate to fit in and make friends, he’d let people abuse him. He thought being shoved against a locker made him “one of the guys.” And anytime they slapped him in the face or raised their fists in haymaker, he backed down in fear of receiving a full blow. It was Andy “Sandman” Lane who pulled him aside and told him what was what. Your first punch is always the hardest. You see so many clips of guys getting knocked out—you think that will happen to you. But getting punched is more annoying than painful. Train your brain to be aggressive and then you’ll be unstoppable.
Sandman was an up-and-comer when he first met Ralph. An amateur expected to turn pro. Problem was, he had a drug problem. The same god-like thrill he felt fighting in the ring or on the streets was also found smoking crack. Not so much the pleasure, he’d been hooked by how loved he’d felt. As if he could do no wrong; as if all humanity suddenly looked upon him with the gushing adoration of a newborn. Sandman had difficulty holding a conversation and maintaining eye contact, something about the judgmental attitudes of others. Everywhere he went, faces grew taut, brows furrowed, and eyes cascaded up and down, deciding in an instant whether he was welcome. Most tolerated him out of uncertainty. He didn’t look particularly dangerous, didn’t command the same respect as fighters with sterner faces and cauliflower ears, but Sandman could knock people out. His mere presence signaled an alarm: they sensed something in him but couldn’t put it into words. Only 165 pounds, Sandman can drop guys 200 plus. He had a chin, too. When guys struck him, and he struck them, they went down, and he stayed standing. Which is why he’d taken an interest in Ralph. No matter how much shit he’d endured in high school, Ralph stayed standing. Kept showing up. Both born in DC General and raised on 37th street in Southeast, Sandman saw something of himself in the boy. Something he had felt obligated to nurture and protect. Because no one had protected Sandman.
***
Ralph loved dogs. Not always. As a kid he’d been mauled by two neighborhood rottweilers who’d slipped their chain-link enclosure and gone for the first easy prey they could find:
Six-year-old Ralph.
The ordeal left him bloodied by bite-marks he’d later take pride in—wishing they’d scarred deeper to complement his tattoos. It was Sandman who pulled the dogs off. He wasn’t much of a kickboxer, but he punted each dog as if clearing a furry football through an invisible field goal. Ralph still remembers the yelps and the crunch of jowls giving way to Sandman’s size-11 boots. Although shaken, Ralph felt bad when the dogs were euthanized. Authorities speculated what the outcome might have been had they hit his jugular. Sandman agreed and had felt responsible for the boy ever since. This was after all how he’d earned his nickname—by putting people to sleep. A mercy after what he’d done to the dogs.
***
Ralph had too good a heart to be a fighter, which made him champion material. It’s always the humble guys who go the furthest. He had a professional MMA record of 14 and 0 when he learned Sandman was living on the streets of DC.
The nickname Ralph “Rottewiler” Jones suggested he was an aggressive, high-energy fighter, but this was far from true. As with everything, Ralph fought smart. He’d taken the boxing he’d learned from Sandman and worked in Jiu Jitsu, Judo, even Bruce Lee’s Jeet Kun Do. For someone who started life so anxious, he prided himself on now fighting calm, conquering fear by exposing himself to it. Sandman had taught him this.
“Listen, young. If you’re afraid to take a punch, means you gotta do just that.”
Though Sandman didn’t want to just walk up and smack him. Ralph had to earn it.
They sparred bare-knuckle, which only added to the pressure. Sandman had taught him the basics by then, but Ralph had no idea how fast Sandman was until he tried hitting him. Hands behind his back, chin exposed, Sandman was a ghost. Every punch slipped and evaded.
“Stop holding back!’
“I’m not!”
“Then do something different.”
Ralph paused a beat and cracked him in the ribs with a left hook. The blow hurt his wrist more than Sandman’s torso, but the man was impressed. Proud even.
“Very good,” he said. “You ready for what comes next?”
“What’s that?”
Ralph saw a flash of white, felt a sting in his eye, and woke up curled in the dirt. Some would have called it child abuse. Sandman could have been charged with felony assault of a minor. But punching Ralph was an act of love.
Ralph’s eye swelled to a crusty eggplant. Kids at school laughed in delight.
“Look who got the shit kicked out of him,” they jeered.
Ralph smiled and played along as usual, but something felt different.
“Here, let me do your other eye,” one boy said, raising a fist.
Ralph stood stone still.
“Go on then,” he said.
“What the fuck?”
Ralph angled his cheek. “I said do it, motherfucker.”
The boy backed down. “Nah, man. I always knew you was weird as fuck.”
And everyone seemed to understand from that moment onward—Ralph was not to be messed with. He never threw a single punch.
***
Sandman had always been poor. Had somehow scraped together enough rent money coaching, fighting, and working odd jobs here and there—digging trenches, manning a parking booth, even retail at an outlet mall. His first street bout for money was out of boredom—not desperation. Just a way to pass an otherwise uneventful Saturday. Yet he remembered feeling as if he had compromised himself soon after. Like he was now damaged goods. Even though he had won—a first round TKO—he was a budding pro filmed in an alley against some no-name street tough. A fighter’s worth is determined by his résumé. Not just his win-to-loss ratio but the quality of the fights he takes. If you want to be a contender, you need to pit yourself against real fighters, not bums banging heads for beer money. Sandman justified further street fights with his warrior mentality. Different than a fighter, a warrior fights for the pleasure of it. No need to curate spectacles for hype, glamor, and purse-earnings—that’s not what motivates a warrior. Like an immigrant parent who knows his life is limited but believes his children might flourish, Sandman trained Ralph with the opposite mentality: Ralph is a fighter. A champion. Not meant for backyard brawls but headlining main events. Pay-per-view events.
It was never a question of one day earning millions. Not an if but a when. Even if Ralph didn’t believe it, Sandman believed it. Believed with enough conviction to override Ralph’s pervasive sense of doubt. Thought patterns Sandman accepted for himself but absolutely refused for Ralph. Sandman wasn’t just a great hype man; he was a negative emotion sponge—absorbing and then neutralizing anything other than a sense of pride and accomplishment. Ralph “Rottweiler” Jones’ flawless professional record came after numerous trial-and-error defeats as an amateur. He lost more than he won—those first few fights when you’re more worried about looking good than performing well, with controlling nerves more than dominating your opponent—before Ralph locked in his signature style, built up his cardio, and believed what Sandman instinctively knew: that Ralph was destined for greatness.
His first fight—loss.
His second fight—loss.
“Maybe I’m not cut out for this,” Ralph said.
“Champ—you won both those fights,” Sandman said without flinching. “The judges had it out for ya.”
Ralph didn’t quite believe him but detected no lie in voice or demeaner.
Fight number three was a win.
Next came a string of losses that would have made any fighter quit.
“I’m literally 1 and 5,” Ralph complained, but again—Sandman bended reality.
“You’re losing because you’re not an amateur. You belong in the pros.”
This sounded like a janitor applying to be a CEO, yet Sandman spun it in a way that made sense. The amateur division is loaded with skilled fighters who stack up wins preying on newbies way below their weight class. But it’s just a hobby for them; they’ll never turn pro.
“Don’t quit before you’ve begun, champ.”
Problem was Ralph had nothing to fight for other than Sandman’s insane belief in him. He liked hearing the smack-smack-smack of gloves against mitts. Enjoyed their time spent outside training—grabbing Mexican food for the calories or cleaning up litter in the neighborhood, just to set a good example. The place you keep reflects your internal state, and they would always treat the little they had with the utmost respect. This is why Sandman taught him to wipe down his gloves after training, mop up the gym before heading home, and more than anything: take care of your sparring partners. Invest in quality relationships. Boxing is a solo sport, but behind every great fighter is a team—a family—of sweat and leather.
No one had invested so much into Ralph as Sandman. Not even his own mother, who tolerated rather than encouraged his boxing. And each and every fight he lost, he was calling Sandman a liar. Negating his efforts. Once he realized this—it infuriated him. Because Andy “Sandman” Lane was many things but a liar he was not. When Ralph stepped into the ring, he was representing his coach, representing Sandman, and his belief in Ralph had never once wavered. Those were his losses too, yet Sandman never flinched. Never backed away. Never called Ralph anything other than “champ” or “king.”
His next fight, Ralph entered the ring dead set on proving Sandman right. It was the first time he knocked somebody out—and he did it in the first round.
***
Scan a brain in love against a brain on cocaine and they look virtually the same. The same sense of euphoria, the same reward and motivation pathways lit. Love is a glorious addiction. One we’re all chasing in one form or another. Sandman had hidden his habit for nearly a decade, exploiting adolescent Ralph’s naivete with misdirection and subterfuge. The odd hours he kept? The Da Vinci sleep system. His chronic lack of money? Rotten luck. His shabby dress and frequent encounters with law enforcement? Well, that’s everyone around here. It was easier for Ralph to believe this version of Sandman than admit the alternative: that his saintly father figure and boxing coach—the only person who ever believed in him—was addicted to crack. Sandman’s family had long since abandoned him, unable to tolerate the kleptomaniac antics that comes with substance abuse. They had been supportive at first, even after he had pawned most of his mother’s jewelry and was caught red-handed with his father’s tool bag. But they couldn’t will him into sobriety and keeping him around was financially unsustainable.
There were moments training Ralph where Sandman felt almost free of his affliction. A greater resilience earned by caring for the boy. As if Ralph’s belief in him as a responsible adult allowed him to believe it too. Until a negative interaction with his family, with the police, with the woman across the street would send him crawling back to the crack pipe—to the love and validation he so desperately needed after social rejection.
The closer Ralph came to turning pro, the less confident Sandman felt as a coach. When high, he was invincible, could do anything, fight anyone, knew everything. However, what goes up must come down in direct or even greater proportion. He could train a kid—sure—but a pro? Ralph’s success was a mirror—and rather than face-down his inadequacies it was easier to disappear. He withdrew emotionally at first, offering praise and acceptance less freely than before. He was late to training and moody on arrival, communicating in actions what he was too cowardly to articulate—that Ralph would be better off without him.
There were gyms in Vegas expressing interest in Ralph. Gyms with money. Gyms with diagnostic equipment to study their fighters’ physiology. Gyms that inked contracts with outlandish fight promotors. When they finally did talk, Sandman framed it as a good thing. You’ve outgrown me, champ, like Sandman was a Christmas sweater ready for replacement.
Excited by Vegas but unnerved by Sandman’s body language, Ralph asked:
“But you’re still in my corner, right, Coach?”
Sandman’s face went slack. He shook his head, no, mumbled something about stepping out of the way for the new coach. Ralph cycled through all stages of grief like an emotional slot machine.
Stop playing, he denied.
…
We can split money fifty-fifty, he bargained.
. . .
Coach, I can’t do this without you, he said dejected.
. . .
Finally, he landed on anger.
“Fuck you!”
He connected with a textbook left hook and then froze with widening eyes. Sandman ate his best sucker punch and smiled for more. Whatever insecurities he had felt as a coach should have melted away. He was a far superior boxer. He outmatched Ralph, outclassed him, slipping haymakers and landing jabs: pop-pop-pop. But this was no boxing match; this was a street fight. Ralph shot a double-leg and took it to the ground, activating wrestling skills Sandman never learned. He locked in a rear naked choke and squeezed.
“Tap out!” Ralph yelled, applying pressure. “Coach, you gotta tap!”
Sandman gurgled and went limp.
“Oh fuck,” Ralph said, pushing him off. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”
***
Sandman left before the paramedics arrived. A sunken shadow of a man who didn’t throw another punch, didn’t say another word, just grabbed his duffle from the locker room and dragged himself out the back door head locked low and to the left.
“Coach,” Ralph called one last time, no longer angry, no longer bargaining, just plain heartbroken.
His faded brown focus mitts were still inside the ring. The only traces of Sandman left behind.
***
Ralph began collecting dogs after turning pro. First a rottweiler rescue, then a lab mix as a favor to a friend. He found a mutt whose owner could not be identified and added him to the roster. He worried about affording all the pups until purse winnings became annual salaries. Job titles which grew more impressive with each successive win. For Jones vs. Diego he earned as much as a kindergarten teacher. For Jones vs. McCallister a web developer. Jones vs. Maxwell an air traffic controller. By his tenth professional fight, he made as much as a trauma surgeon. Compared to where he had started in life, money was no longer a concern. He bought his mom a three-bedroom town home even though she lived alone. He bought shoes, and cars, and bling—anything he couldn’t afford as a child he’d charge without question to his black-card Visa.
But nothing he bought seemed to satiate the emptiness he felt without Sandman. If it was Sandman’s belief in him that helped him go pro, it was his absence that motivated him now. A meaner, more technical fighter. In his dreams Sandman was still Coach. They’d train and hustle and perform small deeds across DC. Then he’d wake up in Vegas—his stomach still knotted over their last encounter. He fought now to prove Sandman wrong. To show him, wherever he was, everything he was missing out on by giving up.
His discipline and willpower were ironclad. He went viral with a morning routine that began with a 10-mile run followed by an ice plunge in winter. Yet a strange compulsion ballooned within him: more dogs. Every so often without rhyme or reason, he just had to adopt another. His pack went from three to five to 10 in the span of a year. His dogs were always happy to see him and never failed to lift his spirits, which, for a man paid to be macho, giggling and rolling on the floor with his furry friends felt like a child-like release. A strange and safe call-back to when Sandman had saved him all those years ago.
***
Dogs became his personal brand. What the public came to expect. He walked out flanked by two rottweilers and the crowd roared. He walked out cradling a pug and they loved him even more, proceeding to break his opponent’s nose in the second round. Eventually, like any vice or outlet, Ralph’s many dogs began to diminish rather than add to his life. Walking and feeding and caring for their needs was a full-time job. He hired assistants but felt distrustful, like a helicopter parent who can only relax leaving the babies with grandma.
He thought about hiring Sandman as a live-in sitter. Just because he refused to coach didn’t mean they weren’t family. Dogs became a pretext for searching him out. Sandman had built his own brand in DC’s underground boxing circuit. Practically an urban legend, there were countless videos of him fighting bare-knuckle in back alleys and derelict gas stations. A miserable fate for someone who had so much to offer.
Ralph had this reoccurring fantasy: a rental Escalade rolling up, a viral video of their teary-eyed embrace. He’d fly him back to Vegas and resume prepping for his title fight in March. In one month, he could be champion of the world. The most important fight of his life, and Ralph was going at it alone. The anger he had channeled into further victories had faded; how could he stay mad at someone desperate and on the streets? He had money to provide for Sandman now, get him into therapy, into rehab. He just had to find him.
The private detective he hired scoured DC but came back with conflicting reports: He was in a mental institution. He died months ago. He’s still on the streets, boxing for cash or for crack.
Obsessed with learning the truth, Ralph spent more time sleuthing online than training for his fight. Sandman was the reason he’d gone pro, and his nervous system would not rest until he uncovered the truth. He cross-referenced fight videos with dates and locations:
Has anyone seen this guy? he commented on every video. Tell him Ralph “Rottweiler” is looking for him.
In his many videos, Sandman appeared older, slower but with the same fire in his eye. A fire he had shared with Ralph before sending him on his way. A fire that was dying. Every five minutes Ralph would check his phone for any news. A new fight video, an obituary notice. He could not rid his mind or his consciousness of his former coach. Without proper closure, he did the next best thing: he wrote a letter. A victory speech. Every man who earns the title “champion of the world” gets a belt around his waist and a microphone pressed to his face.
“I’d like to dedicate this win,” Ralph visualized himself saying to an audience of millions, “to my former boxing coach. To the man who made me who I am. A man the world might look down on, but who means the world to me. He had his demons but fought through them long enough to make an impact in the life of one child—me.”
It wasn’t much, he knew, but a boxer was not a poet.
He rehearsed it again and again: I’d like to dedicate this win…I’d like to dedicate this win…
More than training, he rehearsed the speech. More than warming up, he rehearsed the speech. And after entering the ring, a voice in his head asked if he was going to win this fight.
Yes, he decided then and there. Otherwise, he wouldn’t get to honor Sandman. He felt a burning in his stomach suffuse throughout his body.
The bell rang.
And he advanced towards his opponent.
***
Benjamin Inks earned a Purple Heart in Afghanistan and an MFA at George Mason University. He combined these experiences by writing the military short story collection, Soft Targets, which was named one of Kirkus Reviews’ Best Books of 2023. He lives and works in Northern Virginia. Follow him on Instagram @Inks__Thinks.
