CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Sunday marks the 12th anniversary of Charlotte native Calvin Brock's fight for the world heavyweight championship at Madison Square Garden.
- After losing a championship qualifier, he had surgery to repair a detached retina and it left him blind.
- Brock went into depression and says some of the hits to his head may have deepened those depths of depression.
- He was inducted in the Carolinas Boxing Hall of Fame in 2013.
The former olympian lost the fight but calls the moment the proudest of his career.
“[I thought] even if I lose this boxing match I still won,” Brock said. “That's all I dreamed, thought of, lived, eat, sleep."
Just a year later, Brock hit a personal low. After losing a championship qualifier, he had surgery to repair a detached retina. The surgery left him blind in his right eye, forcing him out of boxing.
Brock went into depression.
“I went and took an additional life insurance policy so that my wife would be left straight,” Brock said. “I didn’t want to live no more.”
Looking back, he says some of the hits to his head may have deepened those depths of depression.
Along with 33 professional boxing matches, Brock estimates for every 12-round fight, he prepared with nearly 80 rounds of sparring.
“I saw an effect on my equilibrium, my vision, my speech,” Brock said.
He now runs his own business, Jack & Landlords. The company helps tenants finance security deposits on rentals.
“No punches, no stress.”
It’s the kind of thing Brock would like to see his children do when they grow up. Not boxing.
But for Brock, now healthy, happy, and a decade removed from his proudest moment, he says he wouldn’t take it back.
“I was number one in the world. And I proved a lot of people wrong,” Brock said. “And it’s gonna follow me the rest of my life.”
Calvin Brock was inducted in the Carolinas Boxing Hall of Fame in 2013. He retired with 31 wins and 2 losses.