Boxing promoter J Russell Peltz fell in love with boxing when he was 12, saw his first live fight at 14, and was hooked for life. He was named Outstanding Male Journalism Graduate, Temple University, 1968, but after a short career on the sports copy desk of the Evening and Sunday Bulletin in Philadelphia, he became a boxing promoter when he couldn't land the boxing beat at the newspaper. In his more-than-half century in boxing, Peltz has promoted fights at every major venue in Philadelphia as well as most of the casinos in Atlantic City. His fights have been televised by ABC, CBS, NBC, HBO, Showtime, ESPN, USA and SportsChannel. He has promoted or co-promoted more than 30 world championship fights and his business has taken him around the world, from Beijing to Buenos Aires and from Paris to Tokyo. Peltz was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 2004, the Temple University School of Communications and Theatre Hall of Fame in 2010, and the Philadelphia Sports Hall of Fame in 2020.

Readers, writers, and critics alike look forward to each new collection of Thomas Hauser's articles about today’s boxing scene. Reviewing these books, Booklist has proclaimed, “Many journalists have written fine boxing pieces, but none has written as extensively or as memorably as Thomas Hauser. . . . Hauser remains the current champion of boxing. . . . He is a treasure.” Hauser’s newest collection meets this high standard. The Universal Sport features Hauser’s coverage of 2021 and 2022 in boxing. As always, Hauser chronicles the big fights and gives readers a behind-the-scenes look at boxing’s biggest stars. He offers a cogent look the rise of women’s boxing and shines a penetrating light on the murky world of illegal performance enhancing drugs and financial corruption at the sport’s highest levels. He explores how boxing has become a tool in the high-stakes world of “sportswashing” by Saudi Arabia and a flash point for discussions about Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine. The book culminates in a memorable four-part essay on the craft of writing coupled with reflections on Hauser’s own induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

The Pennsylvania Boxing Hall of Fame (PABHOF) was established in 1958 to honor the elite performers of the state's boxing history. The first five-person class of inductees included ring legends Billy Conn, Harry Greb, Tommy Loughran, Philadelphia Jack O'Brien, and Lew Tendler. The PABHOF continued to induct outstanding participants of the sport who either hailed from the state or had an impact on the Pennsylvania boxing story. By 2023, the list of honorees numbered 438 and included champions, contenders, club fighters, trainers, managers, promoters, cutmen, and other key members of the boxing community. John DiSanto is a boxing historian and writer. He coauthored the books Boxing in Atlantic City and Grace and Grit: Boxing at Shuler's Gym . DiSanto, the founder and editor of PhillyBoxingHistory.com, is a New Jersey Boxing Hall of Famer and is the chairman of the PABHOF. For this work, he has compiled photographs and profiles of many noteworthy PABHOF members as well as a complete listing of every person inducted from 1958 to 2023.

Abandoned on the streets of Philadelphia at age four, Matthew Saad Muhammad (1954-2014) survived orphanages, street gangs and prison to become one of the most exciting prizefighters of boxing's Golden Age of the late 1970s and early 1980s. Time and again he battled back from the brink of defeat to win against the best fighters of the era. His victory over Marvin Johnson for the WBC Light Heavyweight Championship was described by one veteran boxing writer as the only fight he covered where it seemed both fighters might die. He fought not just for wealth and fame but to discover his identity--he had no idea who he was, where came from or what happened to his parents. This book reveals the full story of "Miracle Matthew" and how he became one of Philadelphia's great ring legends.