It had been a strange week, but then again, he was a professional wrestler.

He'd hardly been able to train, nursing an injury from last weeks' unsuccessful battle royal. A young upstart had challenged him to a fight, lasting just long enough to make his injury even worse. His old gym wanted him to defend their honor by taking up the challenge of an old man who seemed impervious to submission holds.

And now he found himself matched against a 400-pound mass of iron thews named Leroy. Of course, KnightMask himself weighed all of 185 pounds. But he guessed that didn't matter, because he was facing Leroy in his home state of Michigan, in the Joe Louis Arena.

The Joe Louis Arena.

Named for the man who, weighing little more than KnightMask, defended the undisputed heavyweight world title a record 25 times. And amongst the challenges he turned back were the likes of 6'6, 260-pound Buddy Baer, whom Louis had first knocked down three times...and then dispatched of in less than a round. Before that, there had been the gigantic Italian pugilist, Primo Carnera, known as the Ambling Alp. 6'5, 270 and made of rock solid muscle on whale bone. Carnera had lasted six lopsided rounds with Louis before finally being finished off. There was Abe Simon, who fell before Louis like a great redwood under the axe of a woodsman.

And yet, there were other giants yet larger.

The giant that was Nazi Germany, whom he had stood against as a single man when entered the ring against his former conqueror, Max Schmeling, to risk his title and his career in order that he might defend the honor of his nation. A nation which, at that point, was still in the throws of segregation. And yet, when asked about his loyalty to America, given his less than equal status, he had simply replied, "There's nothing wrong with America that Hitler is going to fix."

Another giant he did not go into battle against, but rather held aloft on his broad, brown shoulders, as a 20th century Atlas. That giant was the United States of America, to whose efforts against the Nazis he donated the entirety of two fight purses.

And perhaps the greatest giant of all was prejudice, which Louis battled not with his fists, but with his example of courage, honor, class and charity.

KnightMask had but one giant to contend against, and that a giant of mere flesh and blood. Bad knee or no, could he step into an arena named for Michigan's greatest sporting icon and do any less than give whatever strength lay within his muscles and his very soul and make sure that every last bit of it was left within the ring on that Wednesday night? Perhaps the match would aggravate the injury, perhaps Leroy's prodigious strength would simply leave him wrenched apart and worse than beaten.

But he couldn't pull out, injury or not. Training or not. Maybe another time, maybe another place.

But not in Michigan. And not in the Joe Louis arena.