BOXING : Maybe Dokes Deserves Just a Little Credit for Softening Up Holyfield

Boxing fans who are still talking about the surprisingly good showing Alex Stewart made against Evander Holyfield in their heavyweight bout last Saturday night in Atlantic City, N.J., are missing the point, according to Marty Cohen.

The point, according to the 92-year-old Cohen, is that Stewart was taking advantage of the way his fighter, Michael Dokes, had softened up Holyfield last March.

Holyfield knocked out Dokes in the 10th round of their exciting match, called by many the best heavyweight fight of the 1980s. But before he took out Dokes, Holyfield took considerable punishment. What’s more, Cohen thinks Dokes’ showing against Holyfield explains why Don King is balking at a Mike Tyson-Dokes fight.

“I said it at the time and I’m still saying it,” Cohen said, “Holyfield will look progressively worse each time out, after the Dokes fight. Michael took a lot out of the kid.”

The busy Dokes will fight Lionel Washington at the Forum Monday night. Cohen is mapping out a game plan whereby the one-time World Boxing Assn. champion might get a Tyson fight next year. He has bouts planned for Dokes in December, February and June, hoping King will come around with Tyson by late summer.

In the meantime, Cohen and Dokes will quietly accept the injustice meted out by the man who controls the heavyweight champion, King. The problem, according to Cohen, is that King wants to control Dokes, too.

“Not too long after the Holyfield fight, I got a call from Don,” Cohen said this week. The conversation went like this:

“Marty, I want Michael for Tyson on Oct. 15.”

“Fine, Don, but I want Michael to have more time, like another month or so. What kind of money you talking about?”

“One million . . . and three options. What kind of money are you talking about?”

“Three million, but we can talk. And no options.”

“That was pretty much the end of it,” Cohen said. “Don never called me back. I had a talk with him in his office later in New York. The money was never talked about. He insisted on three options, and that’s what killed the match.”

The feisty Cohen, who three months after being fitted with a stainless steel right hip is getting around well without so much as a cane or a limp, said he is as puzzled as anyone else by how King is handling the champion these days. Cohen, who taught King the ins and outs of boxing promotions in the mid-1960s, can’t figure out why Tyson is being set up with setups (90-second wonders, they’re also called) instead of with higher-quality opponents such as Holyfield and Dokes.

“I know Don King better than anyone in boxing, and I can’t for the life of me figure out what he’s trying to do with Tyson,” he said. “He’s getting him fights with Razor Ruddock and Buster Douglas, for crying out loud. Buster Douglas! I’ve been in boxing 79 years, and I can’t imagine why you’d want Mike Tyson to fight Buster Douglas.

“In pro boxing, you take your big-money fight as quickly as you can get it. The Tyson-Holyfield bout should have been held by now. Instead, they’re talking about next June. Already, that fight has lost something because Holyfield did not look good against Stewart. Don knows better than that. Sometimes I think there’s something else involved here, something that Don won’t talk about. I don’t know what it is, and I’m not going to guess.”

The Cohen-Dokes team is one of boxing’s good, warm stories. To Dokes, Cohen is “Pops,” and Cohen’s wife, Lillian, is “Mom.” Cohen grew up on New York’s lower East Side and is a millionaire who lives in Miami. Dokes is 31, comes from Cincinnati and is on his way back to being a millionaire again, with help from Cohen.

Cohen manages Dokes for free. He negotiates for his bouts and invests his money. At one time, before cocaine came into his life, Dokes had a lot of money.

“At one point in Michael’s career, after he’d had three $1-million-plus paydays, I’d invested about $2 million of Michael’s earnings in tax-free municipal bonds and Ginnie Maes,” Cohen said. “He was set pretty good and he had his best income years ahead of him.

“Then came the cocaine, and he went through almost everything. When he finally came out of rehab, about the only thing he had left was a triple-A rated Florida municipal (bond) I bought for him. It has 20 years to go and it’ll pay him over that time about $500,000, tax-free.”

Dokes came out of rehabilitation clean but weighed 300 pounds. He asked Cohen to pick up the pieces.

“We had long talks, Mike and I,” Cohen said. “One thing Mike learned in rehab was that he needed someone to talk to about his drug problem. So he talks to me. Sometimes I’ve felt like a priest in a confessional. But he’s done great, he’s stayed clean. He talks to high school kids a lot and it’s as good for him as it is for the kids.”

Boxing Notes

Las Vegas’ Showboat Hotel will conclude its boxing shows Nov. 21 with the Steve Collins-Edward Neblett bout, after which its arena will become a bingo parlor. On the same date, Ram cornerback LeRoy Irvin will become a boxing promoter when his first show is scheduled for the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, featuring a heavyweight main event: Orlin Norris vs. Tony Tubbs.

Jorge Paez, the International Boxing Federation featherweight champion from Mexicali, is in tough against Lupe Gutierrez of San Jose in an NBC-TV title bout at Reno Dec. 9. Gutierrez was one of the United States’ most underrated amateur boxers in 1984 and has quietly put together a 20-2 pro record.

Bob Arum’s Olympic heavyweight champion, Ray Mercer, will fight Jerry Jones Tuesday on ESPN.