1. Palesky's Show A Knockout
Friday, January 9, 2009
Paterson Herald News
FAIR LAWN — Tim Palesky’s career as a boxer
ended the same night it started in 1979.
A 17-year-old student at Fair Lawn High
School, Palesky entered the New Jersey Golden
Gloves Tournament that year, hell-bent to learn if
those basement beat-downs of a few friends
meant anything.
He entered the ring wearing an old bathrobe, a
friend’s wrestling shoes and a lot of tape on an
ankle he fractured earlier that day in gym class.
KEVIN R. WEXLER / STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
Tim and Rose Mary Palesky at Fair Lawn’s Cablevision. Rose Mary
works the camera for her son’s show "Knockout TV."
He didn’t run to prepare for his amateur debut. He didn’t spar, either. And, quite naturally, Palesky
didn’t win that three-round bout at the Elizabeth Armory.
Thirty years later, Palesky has resumed his boxing career. Only now, this friendly, mild-mannered Fair
Lawn resident tries to score interviews, not points.
A barber by trade, Palesky, with the help of numerous family members and friends, has produced 37
episodes of "Knockout TV," a half-hour, public-access show broadcast by Cablevision in Bergen and
Passaic counties each Wednesday night at 10 p.m. on Channel 76.
In 22 months on the air, the no-budget show has televised interviews with legends such as Joe Frazier,
Evander Holyfield, Thomas Hearns and Lou Duva, as well as such contemporary stars as Joe Calzaghe,
Oscar De La Hoya, Ricky Hatton, Bernard Hopkins, Roy Jones, Jr., Floyd Mayweather, Jr., Shane
Mosley and Ronald "Winky" Wright.
"I interviewed Joe Frazier in the ring he fought Ali in," Palesky said. "That was at the Garden, when
they retired the ring [in October 2007]. Because of that fight, March 8, 1971, I’m a fight fan. I was 10
years old. And I told Joe Frazier that. I go, ‘Joe, because of you, I’m a fight fan. I want to thank you.’ "
Fighters from Northern New Jersey are thankful that Palesky has afforded them another outlet. Recent
shows have featured Paterson natives Kendall Holt, the World Boxing Organization junior welterweight
champion, Henry Crawford, an unbeaten welterweight prospect, and Jeremy Bryan, an undefeated junior
welterweight prospect.
They’ve all sensed sincerity in Palesky’s voice and have appreciated the compassionate approach
Palesky and his co-host, Mahwah’s Joe Horn, have taken to covering an often unforgiving game. Horn
and Palesky typically delve into a fighter’s family situation, the most common inspiration boxers cite for
willingly taking punches to the head.

2. Palesky knows all about the importance of family.
The show never would’ve debuted if he hadn’t convinced his mother, 77-year-old Rose Mary Palesky,
his brother, Chris, his sister, Pat Colegrove, his nephew, Scott Colegrove, a neighbor, Matt McGuire, and
Horn, a salon client with whom he often discussed boxing, to take Cablevision’s required eight-week
training course to produce the show. They needed eight people, but when one friend bailed on the project
after the first two-hour class, Cablevision executives allowed them to proceed.
"I find this fascinating," said Rose Mary Palesky, a crossing guard in Fair Lawn who moonlights as her
son’s camera woman. "We’ve been in it a year-and-a-half or so, and the people we meet are unreal. I’m
amazed."
Tim Palesky remains amazed that his lifelong love of boxing has led to something so fulfilling. He
knows that HBO color commentator Max Kellerman got his start starring in a weekly boxing show on
Manhattan cable access in the mid-1990s, but Palesky isn’t getting ahead of himself.
"Everybody wants to be rich and famous," said Palesky, 47. "I would love to hang up my scissors and
do this for a career. If something comes from this, I would be the happiest man in the world. If nothing
comes from this and it ends today, it’s been the greatest ride. I love it."