The violence is now done, the thrill gone. Mago says his face hurts. Or is it his head?

The boxer collapses into a foldout chair, his hands still encased in protective white wraps. Here is a 6-foot-3, 231-pound vessel damaged by the 10-round bout he has just lost. In the black-blue arena, where tickets sold for $50, $100, $200, $300, he took 50, 100, 200, 300 punches, many to the head.

Hovering about in the suffocating room are all types: Mago’s father, his brother, his trainer, his cut man, his manager, his manager’s son. A doctor with a kit in his hand. A boxing inspector with wraps on his mind. The ghosts of the middleweight Willie Classen, who died days after a brutal bout in this arena in ’79, and the lightweight Gino Perez, who died days after taking a pummeling here in ’83, and whose last words, while he was still in the ring, were:

“Oh, jeez, my head.”

A Blood Clot Forms

There have been other traumatic brain injuries, other deaths caused by bleeding in the brain. Now, a blood clot is forming in Mago’s skull, compressing space, requiring a relief of pressure before it’s too late.

Brain bleeds can be slow to reveal themselves. Doctors in the boxing trade often cite the death of the actress Natasha Richardson, who hit her head while skiing on a beginner’s trail in 2009 and appeared to be fine — even joking about her fall — but then lapsed into a coma from which she never recovered.

It is an imperfect analogy. Richardson’s death was accidental, and a result of a single blow. Boxing’s intent is to render your opponent unconscious, with brain trauma an anticipated possibility.

Mago studies his pulped face in the dressing room mirror. He is not a cursing man, but bad words escape. He is saying his face hurts, or maybe it’s his head that hurts. The back and forth between English and Russian confuses things.

His younger brother, Abdusalam Abdusalamov, tries to calm him. His cut man, Chico Rivas — whose tools include Vaseline, Q-tips, and an “eye iron” to cool and reduce swelling — scurries to find ice.

The doctor in the room, Gerard Varlotta, a sports medicine specialist, places his bag beneath a low shelf that he bumped his head against in a prior exam. Another veteran commission doctor, Anthony Curreri, an ophthalmologist fresh from having sewn up another boxer’s face — “repairing,” he will say — soon joins him.