Not Down for the Count

Just in time to fill the Christmas stocking comes “Evander Holyfield’s ‘Real Deal Boxing’ ” from Sega of America.

The video game for the Sega Genesis system hit the stores in August, and is being promoted by toy stores as a Christmas gift.

Only problem is Holyfield lost boxing’s heavyweight championship a little more than a week ago to Riddick Bowe. Now, Holyfield is even talking about retirement.

This isn’t the first ill-timed boxing game released by Sega. The Redwood City-based company, part of Japan’s Sega Enterprises, introduced a game named after James (Buster) Douglas, who held the heavyweight title all of eight months.

But Sega of America Chief Executive Tom Kalinske said the game, in which players eventually fight Holyfield, remains popular. “Now we can give everyone else in America a chance to do what Riddick Bowe did,” he says.

As for a Bowe video game, Kalinske suggests that Sega will proceed cautiously.

“We want to see him in another fight or two,” he says.

368 Days and Counting

Resolution Trust Corp. President Albert V. Casey is promising that he can complete the nation’s savings and loan cleanup fast if Congress gives him the money.

If the sale of the Doubletree Resort near Palm Springs is any indication, that may be easier said than done.

Saturday marked the one-year anniversary of the day the RTC believed that it got rid of the resort in a highly publicized auction it declared a big success.

But the sale to Los Angeles investor Charles Lee has yet to close. The trouble started when the RTC was forced to restructure the deal after homeowners at the resort declared that they wanted to exercise an option to buy part of its golf course.

A spokeswoman for the RTC says the agency is still trying to close it.

Take a Number

One of the bigger lines forming in Hollywood these days is for people wanting to distance themselves from audacious European financier Giovanni Di Stefano.

Di Stefano caused a brief stir earlier this month by proclaiming that he wants to buy the famed MGM studio for $500 million. Elaborating on his grand plans, Di Stefano boasted that a tiny Culver City firm, Elixar Entertainment, might be his vehicle in building a Hollywood empire.

Reacting to an item here last week on Elixar and Di Stefano, Elixar President Nick Kimaz issued a statement saying he wants nothing to do with Di Stefano. “We want to cut all ties to him,” Kimaz says.

Briefly . . .

The $200,000 annual salary Bill Clinton will earn as President is less than 20 players on the last-place Dodgers will make this year . . . Likewise, President Bush’s $148,400 annual presidential pension is less than 20 players on his son’s Texas Rangers baseball team will earn this year . . . Baskin-Robbins USA has dropped efforts to pressure 21 Choices, a frozen yogurt shop in Claremont, into changing its name to something less like its 31 Flavors trademark.