Boxing / Earl Gustkey : No Love Lost Between Mancini and Camacho

Ray (Boom Boom) Mancini balanced a plate on one knee and stabbed at chunks of fruit with a plastic fork. With his other hand, he slapped his free knee, possibly imagining that it was Hector Camacho’s face.

“This isn’t for money!” he told a reporter, in an agitated manner.

He said he believes that beating Hector Camacho would be more a public service than strictly a business proposition.

“People think I’m doing this just for the money. Hey, I’ve been offered more money to come back and fight Roger Mayweather, Greg Haugen and Juan Coggi. But none of those fights turned me on. This one does.”

Mancini pointed across the room toward Camacho. The prince of New York’s Spanish Harlem was flexing his muscles for photographers, mock-combing his hair, showing off his gold chains and preening.

“Can you believe him?” Mancini said, stuffing more grapefruit wedges in his mouth.

“I can get up for this guy, believe me. It used to be, years ago, he just bothered me. He was like a mosquito that had flown into a room I was in. But now, he’s a lot more annoying. Now I finally get to pick up the fly swatter.”

This was at a news conference the other day to announce the date, March 6, and site, Reno, for Mancini’s return to boxing.

Mancini looked over his shoulder again at Camacho. The Macho Man was flexing again and asking a woman if she was married.

“Look at that,” Mancini said, disgustedly.

“See, those people are laughing, but he doesn’t understand that they’re laughing at him, not with him.”

Mancini, 27, has been out of the ring for 47 months, since he absorbed a second beating from Livingstone Bramble and retired. Since then, he has appeared in two movies, two TV shows and 10 commercials, made a workout video, done some boxing TV commentary and bought a condo in Santa Monica and a house in Youngstown, Ohio, his hometown.

“Santa Monica is nice, but Youngstown is forever,” he said.

So we probably can believe him when he says he doesn’t need to fight Camacho to pay bills. It should be noted, however, that the promoters are saying that the two will split a guaranteed $2 million, and that pay-per-view revenue could kick it up to an additional $2 million to $3 million each.

Still, Mancini pushes the public service message.

“I don’t respect a guy who looks down at society’s rules and says: ‘I’m going to do anything I want.’ He’s bad for boxing, a poor role model for kids. How would you like it if your son was looking up to this guy?

“People from Spanish Harlem have come up to me and said: ‘Please, whip this guy’s . . . He’s disgraced us.”

Mancini’s references to Camacho’s questionable citizenship are presumably spurred by Camacho’s arrest record. The latest entry, last February, included charges involving cocaine possession and assault in a Florida case.

When these two boxers were put in the same room this week, you wanted to hold your breath, and not just because a company such as Warner Bros., the pay-per-view telecast distributor, would enter into a multimillion-dollar deal with a guy who once did 3 1/2 months at Rikers Island for grand theft, auto.

No, you also worried that since we’re now in an era in which television’s influence is pulling pro boxing promotions alarmingly close to the cartoon-like silliness of pro wrestling’s, someone might throw a chair. Or a fruit plate.

Camacho tried. He got under Mancini’s skin a couple of times, but Mancini stayed cool. Camacho stayed silly. When they posed for photographers together, fists up, the cameramen motioned for them to get closer together.

When they did, Camacho, leering, said to Mancini: “Hey, you’re breathin’ in my ear, Ray. You must have a passion for me.”

Mancini, who began training in Las Vegas this week, said he would train 5 weeks in Las Vegas, then 3 in Reno. One Las Vegas oddsmaker already has made him a 3 1/2-1 underdog.

The bout will be at 140 pounds, a good number for Mancini.

“I weigh 140-141 right now,” he said. “I’ll have to maintain weight in training, not take it off. Believe me, I’ll be in shape for this guy, because he’s going to run from me all night. If there’s a door in that ring, he’ll find it.”

Dan Goossen, manager of Michael Nunn, said Thursday that Nunn could earn $8 million in 1989 without fighting Sugar Ray Leonard or Thomas Hearns, which is what promoter Bob Arum is trying to arrange.

“It looks like 1989 will be a big year for Michael,” Goossen said, grinning at the understatement. “If it works out that Leonard and Hearns get together, and that Michael wins the undisputed middleweight title and then gets the Leonard-Hearns winner, that would be icing on the cake.

“But even without that happening, we project Michael making something like $5 million to $6 million meeting (Sumbu) Kalambay, then unifying the title against the (Iran) Barkley-(Roberto) Duran winner.

“At that point, if Leonard or Hearns aren’t there for us, we’d probably defend the undisputed title once here, then maybe go to England (in early 1990, most likely) and meet someone like Nigel Benn for $3 million.”

At Thursday’s Los Angeles news conference for the Nunn-Kalambay fight, which will be March 25 at the Las Vegas Hilton, Hearns, who was present along with Leonard, offered another name for the suddenly interesting middleweight sweepstakes.

“I know that Marvin Hagler is back in the gym and working out, so I know he’s at least thinking of coming back,” Hearns said.

Boxing Notes

A couple of big guys, in separate bouts, are set for the Ray Mancini-Hector Camacho undercard: George Foreman and Riddick Bowe, the U.S. Olympic super-heavyweight silver medalist. . . . “A Night with the Weavers” is the theme for the Jan. 31 show at the Country Club in Reseda, where heavyweight Mike Weaver, 37, and his triplet sons, middleweights Floyd, Lloyd and Troy, all will box on the same card for the first time.

Also on Jan. 31, heavyweights Mark Wills and Donnie Coats will meet at the Irvine Marriott. . . . CBS offers junior welterweights Frankie Warren and Mickey Ward Sunday from Atlantic City.

When Mike Tyson, visiting his estranged wife, Robin Givens, was involved in an altercation Wednesday night with a reporter and a TV cameraman in Vancouver, Canada, his adviser, Don King, didn’t even know he had left Las Vegas, a Las Vegas Hilton source reports. Tyson had been in Las Vegas for 2 weeks, training for his bout with Frank Bruno Feb. 25. The first posted Las Vegas odds favor Tyson over Bruno, 9-1.