Pugilist, thespian - now a scholar

The boxer walks through the packed arena and, gathering his robe, steps onto the raised platform as his name is announced and the crowd cheers in appreciation.

It's a scene Randall "Tex" Cobb lived dozens of times as a professional fighter, in venues as small as a high school gym and as large as the Astrodome in Houston. Yesterday, the motions were familiar, but the occasion was anything but.

Yesterday, at age 54, after careers as a boxer and as an actor, Tex Cobb graduated from college. With honors. From Temple University.

"It was nice to have that opportunity to wear a robe, to step up there and not have to worry about bleeding," Cobb said a few hours after accepting his diploma - marked magna cum laude, which signifies a grade point average between 3.50 and 3.74 - in a ceremony at McGonigle Hall.

Cobb earned a bachelor of science degree in sport and recreation management. Emphasis on the word earned.

"This was no honorary degree," said Jeffery Montague, assistant dean of Temple's School of Tourism and Hospitality Management. "He worked hard for this. He's a tremendous guy, a very, very genuine person. Some of the same qualities that made him a successful boxer made him a great student."

There aren't many feel-good stories about old boxers. That makes this one all the more worth telling.

Cobb began his college career in the early 1970s at Texas' Abilene Christian, where he was a football teammate of future Eagles great Wilbert Montgomery. He left school to pursue martial arts (one story has Cobb being kicked out for shooting flaming arrows off a campus rooftop while wearing nothing but an athletic supporter; with Cobb, there are always several versions of the story), which led to boxing, which led him to Philadelphia.

Cobb became part of this city like few outsiders ever do. He worked the door at Doc Watson's. He became fast friends, column fodder and eventual lifesaver to Pete Dexter, the Daily News columnist who was arguably Philadelphia's greatest newspaperman. Cobb trained at Joe Frazier's gym and haunted the Blue Horizon.

Meanwhile, Cobb compiled a professional record of 43 wins, seven losses and one draw. The highlight was his shot at the heavyweight title against Larry Holmes. The 15-round fight, a unanimous decision in favor of Holmes, was so brutal that Howard Cosell famously swore never to broadcast another bout - "my gift to boxing," as Cobb once put it.

"I had opportunities to fight the greatest guys in the world," Cobb said yesterday, "some of the best fighters who ever lived: Earnie Shavers, Michael Dokes, Larry Holmes, Leon Spinks, Buster Douglas. Even greater than having the opportunity to fight them, I was blessed to fight them on the very best day they ever had in their lives."

He paused for effect, then added, "Not that I'm bitter."

As his boxing career wound down, Cobb embarked on a quirky acting career. His Internet Movie Database (imdb.com) profile lists more than 30 film and TV credits, including the Coen Brothers' classic Raising Arizona and Ace Ventura: Pet Detective with Jim Carrey.

A little over three years ago, with the support of his wife, Janet, Cobb decided to go back to college. He approached it the way he approaches everything he sets out to do.

"It was very serious to me," Cobb said during a rare interview at the law offices of Bochetto & Lentz, where his attorney, friend and longtime boxing administrator, George Bochetto, hosted a celebratory luncheon.

"In boxing terms, I would come to die. I believe in full commitment. Not that it always works. You can be absolutely committed and in shape and still come in second. But if you don't give it all that you've got, you have no chance to win."

Cobb has been working at a construction job, then taking SEPTA to Temple's campus. During the most recent SEPTA strike, he walked to class from Southwest Philly. Larry Dougherty, Temple's assistant athletic director for media relations, taught two classes that Cobb was in. Dougherty would bring in guest speakers, such as former Sixers general manager John Nash or Flyers public-relations director Zach Hill, and they would be shocked to find Tex Cobb among the fresh-faced students, asking them tough and provocative questions.

"He got a B-plus on a paper in one class," Dougherty said. "He came to me and asked what he had to do to get an A. Could he redo the paper? Do some extra credit? He wanted to get an A in every one of his classes. If the assignment was to read a chapter, he read it and took notes and came back to class better prepared than anyone, including the teacher sometimes."

His fellow students were often too young to know his history - "Thank God!" Cobb said - but would come back to class after doing a Google search or asking family members about the legendary boxer.

"They'd say, 'You know, my granddad really liked you as a fighter,' " Cobb said. "Yeah, well, bring your granddad by."

Cobb did an internship in Drexel University's sports and recreation department. His senior project was a self-defense program designed for women, to address the issue of on-campus sexual assault. Montague said he thought the program was so well-designed, it could lead to a job opportunity for Cobb.

For now, Cobb will continue swinging his 12-pound hammer on the next construction job. But he is hoping his new degree can be put to use in reforming the sport he still loves.

"When you're a boxer," Cobb said, "their idea of long-term health care is when it stops bleeding. Give me a half hour in a car from here and I can show you five guys who were either champions or top contenders - they'll ask you for a dollar. By the way, got a dollar?"

Cobb can't resist the one-liners, but it's an issue he and his wife are passionate about. Janet Cobb has been working on a documentary about the Blue Horizon's Vernoca Michael, a rarity in the boxing business on two counts: She's a promoter who is both female and fair to the fighters.

"The things that a national commission would address are the things that are happening right here in Philadelphia, on North Broad, at the Blue Horizon," Janet Cobb said.

"There are no fighters at the Blue Horizon who don't know exactly what the purse is," Tex Cobb said. "There are no deals where the manager gets half under the table and the fighter signs a contract for the other half, which has happened in a lot of fighters' careers."

Here, Cobb raised his hand. Most boxers wind up with a fraction of the money they earned in their careers.

"I would like to be a part of the boxing reform that could change that," Cobb said. "Boxing is the only major sport that doesn't have a pension or a retirement [plan]. These guys spend their whole life doing something, and they can't continue to make a living at some point. I don't think all of them need to go to college. But most assuredly, they could learn how to drive a truck or cut hair or do something. They're able to help people. They're able to help themselves."

It is the most animated Cobb gets during a 30-minute interview, and it's possible to glimpse the earnest student who challenged his professors and outworked many of his fellow students - strike that - fellow graduates.

Tex Cobb earned his degree.

"It's a happy-ending story," Janet Cobb said, "like a fairy tale. And we need more fairy tales."