Boxing coach hangs up the punch mitts

Kingsville boxing coach Doug Patterson’s retirement earlier this summer probably went unnoticed in the sports pages of local papers, but the six-time Canadian gold medal coach is happy to slip quietly into retirement and enjoy his life.

“I have great memories that I’ll treasure forever,” he said in an interview this past weekend. “It was the Irish in me that loved the fight game.”

Patterson — a retiree from Heinz — was born and raised in Windsor, but was drawn to Kingsville as a 22-year-old, where he set up shop in 1975 in his Union-OnThe-Lake garage, training several local boxers under the Kingsville Boxing Club name.

Patterson had boxed a bit as a youngster with the Windsor Boxing Club, but didn’t do much fighting outside of the club.

“The Windsor Boxing Club at the time was only fighting in the gym, with the odd trip to Detroit,” he says. “So when I moved to Kingsville, I was determined to form a club that could travel around.”

That determination was the basis for the Kingsville Boxing Club.

One of his first boxers was Ray Taylor from Harrow, who won the Detroit Golden Gloves title under Patterson’s tutelage.

Throughout the 1980s, Patterson honed his craft, picking the brains of the top managers, trainers and coaches and getting some great tips from them.

“If you want to be a world class coach, you’d better talk to a world-class coach,” he said.

In 1985, Patterson dabbled in being a promoter as he and a Sudbury-based coach set up the first Northern Ontario versus Southern Ontario boxing card, which was won by Patterson’s Southern Ontario team on both occasions.

While the 1988 Canadian Olympic team traveled to Seoul, South Korea, Patterson was asked to coach the Canadian National Amateur team in Trinidad and Tobago. He took along a pair of boxers from Kingsville and they both did well.

In 1992, he took the Canadian Amateur team to Barbados for the Barbados Cup, which also included five boxers from his Kingsville Boxing Club.

Kingsville won five gold and a silver medal at the annual Brampton Cup in 1992, which is considered the top amateur tournament in Canada.

One of Patterson’s biggest thrills came in 1994, when he was invited to attend the Cuban boxing system’s Boxing Academy in Havana, Cuba.

“I still have my diploma here,” he said. “It was a big deal for me.”

He credits that monthlong stay in Havana with much of his success.

“We learned from the best in the world at that time,” he said.

It was then that Kingsville boxer Gil Balteiro came to the forefront of the boxing world after winning the bronze medal at the world amateur boxing championships in Istanbul.

Balteiro soon turned pro with Patterson as his coach and manager and went 9-1-1 as a professional.

“He was ranked as the number one Canadian cruiserweight at the time, but they wouldn’t give us a world title shot,” he said.

That wasn’t Patterson’s first foray into the professional ranks, as he’d managed Al York in 1984, who had a fight that ended up on the Wide World of Sports.

“The biggest fight I was involved in was as chief second for Alex Hilton in Montreal in 1999 versus Eric Lucas,” says Patterson. “That was a big payper-view.”

The years have flown by for Patterson, now 73, who lives in Kingsville with his wife Jacky.

He’s had brushes with fame along the way — a 2000 bout between Laila Ali and Crystal Arcand at Casino Windsor where he was the cut man for Arcand comes to mind immediately.

“Laila wasn’t very nice,” he says with a laugh. “You can’t print the word I’d like to use.”

He even told about a brush with famous actor Warren Oates, who was starring in the 1983 film Tough Enough with Dennis Quaid at the time.

“In 1982, I was coaching Brian Cox at the time and the producers asked for a heavyweight for the fighting scenes,” he said. “They also asked me if I could hunt down some Cuban cigars to bring to the States for Warren Oates.”

Doug was named the unofficial Cuban cigar supplier for Warren Oates, whom he only met the once, because Oates passed away suddenly of a heart attack months later.

The draw to the ring also brought him into the world of MMA fighting, where he handled Jo Petahtegoose, who eventually became the U.S. Amateur MMA champion.

As his career wound down, he continued to spend time training world-class boxers and Gil Balteiro’s son Tiago became his next big thing.

Tiago was chosen as one of two boxers to represent Canada at the 2021 World Youth Boxing Championships in Poland, but he and Patterson were forced to miss it because Canada decided not to send a team due to the pandemic.

Andre Courtemanche, a good friend of Doug’s from Kingsville, was his corner man for many years.

This past spring, Doug finally made the decision to retire from the boxing game.

“Being bounced around in a gym at 73 with punch mitts on isn’t fun anymore,” he said. “I’ll be happy passing on my experience to younger coaches.”

And he said his phone has been busy with more than a few calls from coaches wanting to bend his ear.

“I’m glad to be wanted,” he said. “I’ve been fortunate. I’ve seen all parts of the world through boxing. The USA, Barbados, Europe, Trinidad and Tobago. I wouldn’t trade it for anything.”