Boxing / Earl Gustkey : Leonard-Lalonde Bout Never Captured Public

Caesars Palace, despite claiming 3 days before the Sugar Ray Leonard-Donny Lalonde fight that it had sold 11,000 tickets, actually lost millions on the fight.

Although the show was slickly packaged and expertly promoted by Caesars, Titan Sports and promoter Mike Trainer, the ticket-buying public never really bought Lalonde as a credible opponent for Leonard, as figures filed with the Nevada Athletic Commission show.

Caesars sold 5,590 tickets to the fight, held at its 15,200-seat outdoor stadium. The gross live gate came to $2,789,800--for a bout the hotel paid $9 million to acquire. The tickets were scaled from $1,000 ringside to $200.

The hotel gave away thousands of tickets. Three sections of seats were virtually empty, and attendance was announced as 13,246.

And there is also suspicion in some quarters that the Leonard-Lalonde pay-per-view telecast didn’t earn the dollars claimed by Titan Sports of Stamford, Conn. Titan, the telecast syndicator, has claimed a 6.8% buy rate, or 650,000 households--at $29.95 each. Titan paid $9.5 million for syndication rights.

Said Doug Stewart of United Cable of Denver: “We aggressively promoted the fight in our 31 cable systems, and we did a 4.5% penetration. So if Titan says the fight did 2 points higher nationally than what we did, then that makes me feel like a . . .”

Jim Troy, Titan senior vice president, said the 6.8% figure was only an early projection. “The 6.8% figure was based on returns we had, or on about 80% of systems reporting,” he said Friday. “I expect that figure will drop a little, when it all comes out of the wash. But even if it comes down to 6.2%, it’ll still be the most successful pay-per-view event ever.”

Word during fight week was that some cable systems weren’t paying anything like the up-front 5% guaranteed-buy rate asked by Titan for the show. One report had it that Denver-based United Cable, the eighth-largest system in the U.S., after refusing to pay the 5%, eventually got the show for a 1.7% guarantee.

Commented Stewart: “We viewed their first offer as too risky, and we eventually got it for less, and that’s all I’m going to say about it.”

Rival Las Vegas promoter Bob Arum, as always, had lots to say.

“The buy rate was 3.4%,” he said at a pay-per-view seminar in Los Angeles this week.

“There’s no reason to lie about these figures. Sure, everybody lies before a promotion to build up the fight, but it’s atrocious to do it after the fight.

“It’s a gullible press that believes what Jim Troy says. He’s treating the press like they were wrestling fans.” (Titan Sports is the parent company of the World Wrestling Federation.) Whatever, Troy insists that Titan is delighted with the returns and says Titan Sports is in the boxing business for keeps.

“We’ve had 7 different boxing proposals since the fight,” he said.

“One we’re looking at is a Greg Haugen-Pernell Whitaker bout, plus one other championship bout (on the same card), plus the pro debuts of Roy Jones and Andrew Maynard from the Olympic team,” he said.

“We’re looking at that one as maybe a $10.95 pay-per-view show in March.”

The cable industry may need consulting sociologists to show it why pay-per-view boxing shows do well in some systems and poorly in others.

“We had some phenomenal buy rates in some systems, and some very poor ones in others,” Stewart said. “For example, we did a 12.1% in Baltimore, or 729 buys out of 6,000 households. Our highest was 30.5% in West Hartford, Conn., or 855 buys out of 2,800 households.”

The Nevada Athletic Commission confirmed this week that both Robert Hines and James Kinchen tested positive for a banned pain killer after their championship fights at the Las Vegas Hilton Nov. 4.

Hines upset Matthew Hilton for the International Boxing Federation junior-middleweight title, and Kinchen lost to Thomas Hearns in a North American Boxing Federation super-middleweight title bout.

Both tested positive for lidocaine, which is banned in Nevada. “We’ll probably suspend or fine the fighters,” said Dr. Elias Ghannem, commission chairman.

“The drug is illegal. The fighters know it, the managers know it.”

A hearing will be scheduled for December on the matter, according to Chuck Minker, commission executive director.

Hilton probably has just cause to ask that his championship be awarded back to him. A heavy favorite, Hilton fought with a painful rib cage injury.

“Every time I threw a left hook, it hurt me more than it hurt him,” Hilton said afterward.

Boxing Notes

Trainer Lou Duva has been suspended indefinitely by the Nevada Athletic Commission. Video tapes showed that Duva took a swing at Roger Mayweather immediately after Mayweather’s bout with Duva’s fighter, Vinny Pazienza, on the Caesars Palace card Nov. 7. Duva, 70, missed Mayweather with the punch and hit referee Mills Lane instead. Mayweather then hit Duva, knocking him down and bloodying his cheek.

Milford Kemp, 34, one-time dancer and artist but now a pugilist, meets Grover Robinson of Oakland for the state light-heavyweight title Nov. 29 at San Jose. . . . The California Assembly Governmental Organization Committee will ask the State Athletic Commission to formally explain why it waited until the last minute to refuse to allow Sugar Ray Leonard to hold a public workout at Century City Oct. 25. . . . The Southern California Silver Gloves Assn. will hold a boxing tournament for 10-to-15-year-olds Nov. 12-13 at the Hawaiian Gardens Gymnasium.

New date for the postponed Evander Holyfield-Pinklon Thomas heavyweight match is Dec. 9, at Caesars Atlantic City. . . . Tomas Perez of Santa Ana meets Toby Flores of Stockton for the state light-middleweight title in the main event on Don Fraser’s show at the Irvine Marriott Dec. 1.