Johnnie Bradfield, a deadly and cynical prize fighter, has just slugged his way to the championship when, during a drunken brawl in his apartment, his manager, Doc Wood, accidentally kills Magee, a newspaper reporter, and fixes the evidence so it appears that Johnnie has done the deed. Doc then makes his getaway, but perishes in a car accident while wearing Johnnie's watch. The next morning, Johnnie awakens in a strange place and reads a newspaper article informing him that he has perished in a car wreck after murdering a reporter. On the advice of a shady lawyer, the champ flees, changes his identity and becomes an outcast. He lands in Arizona, where he casts his lot with Grandma, who runs a date ranch with the help of Peggy and the Dead End Kids. The Kids have been sent from New York by a kindly priest who wants to rehabilitate the boys. At the ranch, the regeneration of the boxer begins as Peggy helps him to fight his inborn tendency to believe that everyone is a sucker and the world has it in for him. Johnnie's salvation comes when he enters a local fight ring to win some money so that he can help his friends open up a filling station. Meanwhile, New York detective Phelan cleverly picks up Johnnie's trail and tracks him to ringside where he is fighting a heavyweight. As Johnnie slugs his heart out for his friends, the detective begins to reflect and, realizing that the fighter has been punished enough, returns to New York without his prisoner.