Boxing : Monthly Card Planned for Irvine

Boxing is going to Orange County next month, to the Marriott Hotel in Irvine to be specific. Don Fraser, Olympic Auditorium promoter, is leading the sport’s southward expansion, saying, “It’s untouched territory.”

The plan is to go monthly, beginning with a show Feb. 11 in the Marriott’s Grand Ballroom, which can seat 1,500, and to use mostly Orange County fighters.

Although Fraser has promoted in Orange County before, the idea to go regularly wasn’t entirely his. Fraser said the hotel’s director of marketing, Ed Proenza, came to him. Proenza had been associated with a Marriott in Portland where regular boxing shows had been a success.

One other factor is Orange County’s KDOC (Ch. 56), which has been televising fights from the Olympic. KDOC will now have more local fights to televise.

Fraser doesn’t expect regular boxing in Orange County to have any effect on his shows at the Olympic, since they will be drawing from different pools of boxing talent and catering to entirely different crowds. Although the Orange County promotions will be local, the Olympic will maintain its international appeal, keeping its Mexican legends in action, presumably until they drop.

Book Report: Bert Sugar’s “The 100 Greatest Boxers of All Time” is of the coffee-table format. Even so, it’s the kind of book likely to be found where drink stronger than coffee is served. Actually, this is a saloon book, conceived in one and meant to be argued about in one.

Sugar, formerly editor and publisher of Ring magazine, dreamed this one up in New York’s O’Reilly’s Pub, his so-called office in exile. It is possible that readers of this book will believe Sugar himself was drinking something other than coffee during the book’s conception.

Fans of Sugar Ray Leonard, for instance, may be calling for Bert Sugar to take a Breathalyzer test when they learn their hero makes his entry at position No. 56. That’s 24 notches behind Packy McFarland.

Of course, Sugar wants nothing more than to provoke argument. He isn’t in to settling any, that’s for sure. As he writes in the introduction, “I don’t seek to convince you, that would just weaken you; I only want to stimulate you, for that’s the nature of the bar argument.”

Fair enough, Bert. But Muhammad Ali at No. 10? Bert, are you out of your mind? Take off your hat. Right now.

Boxing Notes

The Stroh’s Boxing Tournament will be resumed at the Forum Wednesday with a light-heavyweight fight between Mike Sedillo and Grover Robinson. That’s a 12-round tournament final. Also on the card, a middleweight bout between Bert Lee and Ernest Rabotte and a welterweight bout between Alphonso Long and Robert Sawyer. . . . The Olympic Auditorium will reopen Jan. 17 with former bantamweight champion Lupe Pintor headlining against Adrian Arreola in a featherweight bout. The next Olympic show, on Jan. 31, has former welterweight champion Pipino Cuevas fighting Herman Montes. . . . Dennis Mulholland has apparently left the Ten Goose stable in The Valley to fight on Thad Spencer’s cards in Bakersfield. Mulholland, from Bakersfield, will meet Ramon Mendoza there Feb. 7. On one of Spencer’s cards there in December, Kelvin Lampkin knocked out former lightweight champion Art Frias. . . Olympic gold medal winner Paul Gonzales has been talking to the folks at the Olympic. The mini-flyweight champion has yet to make his professional debut and probably won’t until after March, when his hand has healed. . . . Spotted at the Forum, one wild-haired boxing promoter currently charged with 23 counts of federal tax evasion. Seems Don King is interested in getting one of his champions some work here. Among his eligible fighters are World Boxing Council lightweight champion Jose Ramirez, WBC junior lightweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez and WBC junior featherweight champion Juan Meza. . . . The most unusual press releases, without a doubt, come from former sportswriter Dave Wolf, the man behind the legend of former lightweight champion Ray Mancini. Included among the clippings he sends are results of neurological and orthopedic testing done on Mancini after each fight. According to Dr. Jeffrey M. Schwartz of New York, Mancini remains in good health, even after the beating he took from Livingstone Bramble. Would that every fight manager thought this kind of information as valuable as the routine puffery put out.