BOXING / EARL GUSTKEY : Here’s a Stunner: Promotion Not True

Federal truth-in-advertising laws apparently don’t apply to boxing.

Promoter Don King and Showtime are advertising one of the participants in tonight’s title fight, Hector Camacho, as being “unbeaten.”

That’s incorrect, and Don King and Showtime know it’s incorrect.

Camacho, who fights Julio Cesar Chavez tonight in a long-awaited showdown, lost a 12-round decision to Greg Haugen in Las Vegas on Feb. 23, 1991. Days later, it was announced Haugen had tested positive for marijuana and a rematch was ordered. Camacho beat Haugen in the rematch. So Camacho, for the record, is 40-1, not 41-0.

Boxing commissions will bend a bit now and then for nearly anyone, but the Nevada Athletic Commission is resolute on Camacho’s loss to Haugen.

“Camacho is 40-1,” said Marc Ratner, interim executive director of the Nevada commission. “His loss to Haugen stands, as far as we’re concerned.”

And anyone who wants to dig deep into Chavez’s record will learn that neither combatant tonight is truly undefeated.

Several years ago, Bob Yalen, now the boxing chief at ABC, heard reports of a loss early in Chavez’s career in Mexico.

Yalen learned that in Chavez’s 12th pro bout, on April 3, 1981, in his hometown of Culiacan, a referee had ruled Chavez a disqualification loser. Chavez cold-cocked one Miguel Ruiz with a punch after the bell had ended Round 1.

But a strange thing happened the next day. The Culiacan boxing commission met and reversed the referee’s ruling and changed the result to a knockout for Chavez.

Investigating further, Yalen asked Chavez’s late manager, Ramon Felix, who was on the Culiacan boxing commission.

“Me,” Felix told him.

This isn’t meant in any way to discredit what Chavez has achieved. He never has been beaten in the ring and he is 22-0 in championship fights. And until someone does beat him, no one can argue his claim, that he is boxing’s best performer.

Look for the announcement soon that Oscar De La Hoya will make his pro boxing debut Nov. 23 at the Forum.

On that date, if negotiations are completed, De La Hoya will become the highest-paid debut fighter ever. He will get about $200,000--for a six-rounder.

“We’re close to wrapping it up, fairly close,” John Jackson, Forum boxing chief, said Friday.

De La Hoya, 19, of East Los Angeles, was America’s only boxing gold medalist at the Barcelona Olympics. He signed a $1-million-plus management contract with New York mortgage banker Steve Nelson a week ago. Nelson outbid Evander Holyfield’s manager, Shelly Finkel, who had sponsored De La Hoya’s amateur career for two years.

“We’re not going to feed Oscar a soft touch,” said Bob Mittleman, a New York matchmaker and an associate of Nelson. “His dad (Joel De La Hoya) told us Oscar needs to meet tough opponents, and we’ll find one for him.”

Meanwhile, Finkel keeps waiting for a call from Joel De La Hoya. Finkel says he has advanced the De La Hoyas about $100,000 since 1990 and expects to be repaid.

“Every time Joel and Oscar needed me the last two years, I was there for them,” Finkel said.

“I never asked them to sign anything. In retrospect, that looks like a mistake. I expect to be treated like a gentleman over this. If I’m not, there will be fireworks.”

Presumably, that means De La Hoya could get sued before he throws a pro punch.

Rock Newman, unbeaten heavyweight Riddick Bowe’s manager, ran into Evander Holyfield at the Las Vegas airport the other day, admiring a sports car on display.

Holyfield will defend his heavyweight title against Bowe on Nov. 13. According to Newman, Holyfield said to him:

“ ‘Rock, how about a bet? If Bowe wins, I buy this car for him. If I win, I buy the car for myself but you have to be my chauffeur for two months.’ ”

Newman, at a news conference here Friday, had this to say about the Holyfield-Bowe fight:

“Evander Holyfield has been an extremely well-managed, extremely well-promoted fighter. But now his moment of truth is here, and his season is over. He will be pulverized by a much bigger, much stronger man.”

Countered Holyfield: “I’ve told Bowe this all along: ‘You can’t be the champion in 1992. You can’t be the champion in ‘93, ’94 or ‘95, either. You can be champion in ‘96, when I relinquish the belt.’ ”

Boxing Notes

Mexico City’s Humberto Gonzalez defends his light-flyweight title Monday night at the Forum against Thailand’s Napa Kiatwanchai. Gonzalez is in his second championship term, having lost the title once on a spectacular 1990 upset by Rolando Pasqua of the Philippines. Gonzalez regained the championship by beating Melchor Cob Castro 15 months ago and is 7-1 in title matches. Kiatwanchai won a decision over Pasqua. Gonzalez almost lost the title a second time in his last defense, at Seoul. He trailed on all three score cards after 11 rounds, then stopped Kim Kwang-Sun during the last round.

Although he is one of the most visible and most popular of Nevadans, boxing referee Mills Lane says he won’t run for public office. Some have suggested he is a possible candidate for the U.S. Senate or the governor’s chair. But Lane, who is a state district judge in Reno and a onetime pro boxer, said there is only one job for which he might leave the courtroom. If proposed legislation in Washington results in a federal boxing commission and Lane were approached about being a U.S. boxing official, he would listen. “That’s the one job that might get me off the bench,” he said.

Los Angeles heavyweight Ikpitan Okoebor has a 5-0 record, but a name that is difficult to pronounce. So, he’s having his name changed to King Ipitan. Ipitan, who is co-managed by Mike Marley, a former boxing writer for the New York Post, has already had his toughest fights in L.A. gyms, where he has held his own in sparring sessions with Michael Dokes, Tyrell Biggs, James Tillis and Tony Tubbs. Ipitan threw the punch during a sparring session that opened a cut over Riddick Bowe’s eye several months ago. Ipitan will fight in a six-rounder tonight on the Julio Cesar Chavez-Hector Camacho undercard. Michael Nunn, onetime middleweight champion and a million-dollar fighter until he abruptly walked out on Dan and Joe Goossen two years ago, will earn $100,000 when he fights Victor Cordoba of Panama, on the undercard.

British writer James Dusgate reports that early 1950s heavyweight contender Roland La Starza, who lost twice to champion Rocky Marciano, is 64 and in frail health in New Smyrna Beach, Fla. . . . No one has been served with papers yet, but Philadelphia amateur featherweight Ivan Robinson has hired a law firm to handle a protest over his two defeats, both on decisions, by Julian Wheeler, at the U.S. Olympic trials and boxoffs. Part of Robinson’s protest is that one of the judges was 65 and couldn’t operate the keyboard computer scoring system’s keyboard with “the same manual dexterity and fluidity” of a younger judge.

Holyfield-Bowe tickets, scaled from $100 to $800, are on sale at The Mirage, which will put on the fight at the Thomas & Mack Center here. The $800 seats are sold out, the Mirage says. . . . Nevada’s boxing commission, like California’s, is hurting because of state budget cuts. Chuck Minker, the commission’s executive director who died several months ago, still hasn’t been replaced. Nevada commission inspector Marc Ratner is filling in for Minker but isn’t seeking the job. No word when the job will be funded again.