BOXING / EARL GUSTKEY : Chacon’s Story Has Not Been Happy

Bobby Chacon found out this week that he still has a lot of fans.

They still remember his spectacular fights at the Olympic Auditorium and the Forum in the 1970s and ‘80s. And many of them in the Southland boxing community called each other this week, trying to learn the latest on the Chacon watch.

The onetime featherweight champion was reported missing this week, but the story had a happy ending. At least for now. Chacon presented himself at a sheriff’s station when he learned that police in two states were looking for him.

Chacon, 41, has not had a happy life in recent years. First there was the 1982 suicide of his wife, Valorie, who had begged her husband to stop boxing.

But Chacon fought on. He fought 11 more times, in fact, despite clear evidence that his best days as a fighter were behind him. He fought through 1985, quit, then came back again for fights in 1987 and ’88.

At the end, friends couldn’t bear to watch. His once-great speed was gone, his reflexes shot, his power only a memory. Even worse, by then he was shuffling, his speech was slurred and he began to exhibit uncontrollable bursts of temper--all classic symptoms of what neurologists call pugilistica dementia .

In 1991, his teen-age son was killed in a gang shootout.

More recently, he had been separated from his second wife, Deborah.

So when he was reported missing in Arizona this week, friends feared the worst. He had gone to Arizona on July 2 with a friend, then called his mother in Pacoima on July 6. Until he showed up at a rural Arizona sheriff’s office Wednesday, though, no one had heard from him since July 6.

Chacon had been on a ranch near Tucson. He said he was “hiding out” because of his marital problems.

If those who would ban boxing were to look for a poster boy, they could stop at Bobby Chacon. From phenom to hard-luck case. It doesn’t get any sadder than this.

Even so, the case against boxing is most often overstated.

Fact is, former boxers with symptoms like Chacon’s--and Muhammad Ali’s--represent a tiny percentage of total participants in the sport. Most boxers who turn pro, in fact, quit after one or two years, deciding there are easier ways to make a living.

Still, cases such as Chacon’s cause worry about anyone who, though highly successful, seems to take too many punches.

Take Michael Carbajal, for example.

He’s the richest little man in boxing history. A light-flyweight champion, he will earn at least $250,000 tonight for fighting South Korean Kim Kwang-Sun, who has had seven fights.

Easy money? Not necessarily. Chances are, Carbajal will win. But chances are, too, he will take more hard shots to the head.

Chacon had 66 fights in 13 years, and took more punches in his last dozen than he had in the first 50. Carbajal, 25, has had 28 fights--he has won them all--in six years. And the only people in boxing who say Carbajal doesn’t take a lot of punches to the head are Carbajal and his brother, Danny.

It certainly seemed to many who watched his war last March against Humberto Gonzalez that Carbajal was taking hard shots to the head. And in many of his other fights, as well.

“Study the video on Michael’s fights,” says Danny Carbajal, Michael’s manager and trainer. “Michael blocks a lot of those punches with his elbows and arms, and he slips a lot of them. The media keeps saying he takes too many punches, but it’s not true.

“The guys who wind up getting hurt are the guys who fight way past the point where they should quit. Michael’s still a developing fighter. He hasn’t even reached his peak yet.”

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Another argument for a national boxing commission: Rafael Ruelas, the No. 1-ranked lightweight, according to two of boxing’s so-called governing bodies, fights Darryl Tyson in a 10-rounder tonight on the Carbajal-Kim card.

In another match, Jorge Paez fights Freddie Pendleton for Pendleton’s lightweight championship.

Hey, wait a minute. Didn’t Paez get his clock cleaned by Ruelas last November at the Forum?

Right. Ruelas stopped him in 10, in a one-sided fight.

So how does Paez rate a title match?

Pendleton and his people wanted Paez, not Ruelas. Why fight the tougher challenger if he doesn’t have to? Paez, they figured, is easy money.

The final indignity for Ruelas tonight is that Paez is making $70,000, Ruelas $25,000.

The governing bodies have a ponderous system of “mandatory” challenges, whereby a champion can pretty much fight anyone he wants for most of a year, but he must face the No. 1-ranked guy once a year.

“That’s boxing--a lot of the time, the most deserving challenger doesn’t get the title shot,” said Dan Goossen, Ruelas’ manager.

“But Rafael will get his shot. The IBF has notified both Pendleton and Paez that the winner must fight Rafael within 90 days or be stripped. And the WBC also has Rafael as the mandatory (opponent) for Miguel Angel Gonzalez’s next defense.”

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Ruelas, by the way, is a late substitute on Bob Arum’s show tonight. Oscar De La Hoya, who was to have fought Narciso Valenzuela, dropped out because of a hand injury.

The TV ads for the Caesars Palace pay-per-view show were very late in pointing out De La Hoya is not on the card.

But then, this is a show even its promoters aren’t too excited about. One TCI Cablevision ad this week spelled Carbajal’s name “Carbahal.”

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USA Boxing, governing body for amateur boxing in the United States, credits one of its physicians, Norman Luebkeman, for saving the life of an Irish boxer last March.

Irish bantamweight Paul Buttimer was going through team physicals in San Jose, days before the USA-Ireland dual match March 13. He complained of severe headaches and vision problems, and Luebkeman diagnosed a cerebral aneurysm, a bulge in the wall of a blood vessel.

The boxer had surgery and is expected to make a full recovery.

Luebkeman said Buttimer’s problem was unrelated to boxing. Boxing Notes

Oscar De La Hoya’s next fight is Aug. 14 at Bay St. Louis, Miss., on an HBO show featuring Roy Jones and South African Thulane Malinga. De La Hoya will meet Renaldo Carter of Detroit in a 10-round bout.

Art Miles, the veteran trainer who once handled heavyweight challenger Razor Ruddock, says Ruddock has major financial problems, in part caused by Miles, who is suing Ruddock for $300,000. Miles says Ruddock owes him the money from Ruddock’s first fight against Mike Tyson. And trainer Janks Morton is suing Ruddock for $800,000, Miles said. Then there’s the case of a woman who is seeking $10,000 a month from Ruddock in a palimony case. Also, Miles said, there is pending litigation by Ruddock’s former promoter, Don King.

Southland medalists at USA Boxing’s recent Junior Olympic Championships at Gulfport, Miss.: Juan Salinas, Vista; James Martinez, Escondido; Sadot Vazquez and Fernando Vargas, Oxnard; Mike Chavez, Harbor City; Eddy Cruz, Adam Reyes and Fidel Hernandez, Los Angeles. Key amateur boxing dates: Sept. 23--USA-Cuba, Biloxi, Miss. Oct 23 and 29--USA-Russia, Camp Lejeune, N.C., and Detroit. Feb. 28-March 5, 1994--U.S. National Championships, Colorado Springs.

USA Boxing will present an amateur boxing show at the Longshoremen’s & Warehousemen’s Memorial Hall in Wilmington Aug. 29, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. USA Boxing, by the way, is facing the first projected deficit in its history. The deficit is currently $356,616. Officials are blaming a “dead” television market and fewer available corporate sponsorships.

The projected live gate for the San Antonio showdown between Julio Cesar Chavez and Pernell Whitaker on Sept. 10 is $8 million. Tickets, priced to $1,000, went on sale May 22 and 19,000 were bought the first day. The site is the 72,000-seat Alamodome. Pay-per-view price for the fight will be $34.95.

Six-foot-six heavyweight Mark Connolly, 34, won his recent Forum pro debut, a four-round decision over Paul Griffin. Connolly’s manager, Larry Williams, says he is happy with Connolly’s showing and hopes to get another four-rounder for him in Las Vegas early next month.

That Reggie Johnson-Julian Jackson middleweight showdown, tentatively scheduled for early November, will be a doubleheader, it turns out. Terry Norris, who might meet the winner, will also box on the card, against an opponent to be named. Norris, who will make $5 million from King for four fights in a 10-month deal, also has a profitable real estate deal cooking. The fighter’s manager, Joe Sayatovich, says Norris will clear more than $1 million for his 17% interest in a home-building project in Branson, Mo. A group Norris has bought into is building 300 homes and 300 apartment units in the new Ozark Mountains resort town.