He retained the title by defeating three boxers over the next ten months. In the fight, on August 2, Hearns crushed Pipino Cuevas with a second-round knockout. John Hearns was getting ready to leave his home in Memphis to see his son fight for the World Boxing Association (WBA) welterweight title in 1980 when he collapsed and died of a heart attack. At six feet, one inch, though his left hand was not as strong and he held it down by his side, Hearns had a powerful, lightning-quick right jab. Solemn and brooding, with heavily lidded eyes, Hearns, nicknamed the "Hit Man," was extremely aggressive in the ring. In his first year as a pro, Hearns won all thirteen of his bouts by knockouts in three rounds or less. After winning 155 amateur bouts and losing only eight, Hearns turned professional on 25 November 1977, knocking out Jerome Hill in two rounds. Hearns dropped out of high school in the eleventh grade and quickly became an amateur boxing sensation. But Steward took Hearns under his wing and became a longtime mentor. John Hearns, who kept in touch with his children by phone, begged his former wife not to let Hearns fight. When he was sixteen, Hearns wandered into the Kronk Recreation Center, where a boxing trainer named Emanuel Steward was trying to groom young talent. The family lived in a small apartment in a poor section of the city. Hearns's mother, Lois, worked in a bank by day and as a hairdresser in her home by night to make ends meet. Three years later, John Hearns left home. In 1963 John Hearns, Hearns's father, took the family to Detroit. He grew tall and taciturn, like his grandfather, whom he would often visit and work with in the fields. Young Hearns lived with his mother's father, Henry Tallie, on a farm near Grand Junction, Tennessee, until he was four years old. 18 October 1958 in Memphis, Tennessee), one of boxing's most versatile and fearless fighters and the only man to win world championship belts in six different weight divisions.
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