Fighting Pride

In California, Lightweight Art Aragon is known as the "Golden Boy." He has a handsome profile, a flashy boxing style, and a smashing left that has knocked out half of his opponents. In Harlem, Lightweight Jimmy Carter is known by no nickname, has the plug-ugly looks of a club fighter, and has about as much crowd appeal as a store-window dummy in the rush hour. But Carter has some assets of his own: a deep pride in the lightweight title he took from Ike Williams in an upset last May, and, as the boxers say, "a pair of good hands." Last summer Carter met Aragon in a nontitle bout, and lost. Last week Jimmy Carter put his title on the line.*

The Golden Boy, 24, and three years younger than the champion, forced the fight for the first five rounds. He bobbed, jabbed, danced and feinted while Carter stolidly accepted his lumps, tossed back only a few retaliatory licks. But in Round 6, Carter opened up. A jarring left sent Golden Boy tumbling to the canvas for a count of three. Carter's slashing, two-fisted attack drove him from corner to corner. Aragon never won another round.

At the end of the fight, his left eye clamped tight, his right slashed, his lips swollen and his body a patchwork of welts, Golden Boy was a slightly tarnished matinee idol. Carter had also taken a beating: a cut over his eye took seven stitches, and may keep him out of action for a year. The $32,000 purse, most lucrative of his obscure career, would help heal the wound. But more important to Jimmy Carter was his title. In his first defense of it, he had come through like a real champion.

* Held in Los Angeles, it was the first "twilight" (7 p.m.) title fight in modern ring history, gave Eastern televiewers a chance to see the result before bedtime.

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