BOXING / CHRIS DUFRESNE : An Odd Place to Be Looking for Money

You have to give Peter Broudy credit for selling a bankrupt idea in a bankrupt county.

With little resistance, the boxing promoter recently stormed into Orange County and negotiated a deal to bring boxing to Anaheim’s Arrowhead Pond for a Feb. 4 card.

“I’m either a genius or the biggest idiot in boxing,” Broudy said this week at a press conference.

In case you haven’t heard, few are flocking to boxing venues in Southern California.

The sport remains a paradox. While boxing on pay-per-view and television consistently does good business, few seem interested in actually attending matches.

Crowds at the Grand Olympic Auditorium were so poor in the first year of its reopening that the venue has renegotiated its deal with Top Rank Inc. to reduce the number of shows in 1995.

Even Oscar De La Hoya, L.A.’s Golden Boy, has been unable to pack the venerable old haunt.

They’re not exactly breaking down the doors at Forum Boxing shows either, although owner Jerry Buss’ deep pockets and love of the sport alone are probably enough to keep the operation afloat.

Broudy is using Orange County to test his theory. If he’s wrong, he loses. It isn’t that people don’t want to go see boxing, he says, it’s that they don’t want to see boxing at the Olympic or at the Forum.

He’s convinced those venues, not located in the best of neighborhoods, scare off fans.

“They are not the safest venues to go,” Broudy said.

“Police Chief” Broudy offers no statistical evidence to support his statement. In fact, in a preemptive strike Tuesday, Olympic Auditorium owner Steve Needleman noted at a press conference for an upcoming fight that he knew of no safety-related incidents at any of his 1994 Olympic cards.

John Beyrooty, Forum Boxing publicist, also took offense to the safety issue.

“That’s an outdated, bogus excuse to draw attention away from L.A. arenas,” Beyrooty said.

Broudy later amended his comments.

“I’m not saying they’re dangerous venues,” he said. “I’m saying it’s perception. It’s mine, too.”

It doesn’t help, of course, that Laker General Manager Jerry West was once robbed in the Forum parking lot.

The Pond is certainly a magnificent arena. Broudy--not to mention everybody else in Southern California except Donald Sterling--couldn’t help but note how the Clippers can’t draw at the Sports Arena but manage to pack the 18,000-seat Pond on occasional visits.

Same crummy team, right?

Broudy thinks the Pond’s location, right off the 57 Freeway near Anaheim Stadium, is well placed to draw from a large population pool of surrounding Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties.

Broudy, who stages successful “Celebrity Boxing” cards at the Warner Center Marriott in Woodland Hills, said he got the idea to stage shows in Anaheim in November after watching Barbra Streisand’s HBO concert at the Pond.

Broudy has a reputation for putting on good shows, although his Feb. 4 Pond opener appears to be overloaded with too many former champions, such as junior-bantamweight Jaime Garza and bantamweight Junior Jones.

Ticket prices--$100, $85, $75, $50, $35, $15--are downright frightening, although Broudy is quick to note more than 9,000 seats are available at $15.

If all goes well Feb. 4, Broudy promises to make boxing in Orange County a fixture.

“I want to be like Ed Sullivan,” he said. “I want to be on television every Sunday night.”

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As George Foreman counts the days until April, and Mike Tyson the days until May, and Oliver McCall the age spots on Larry Holmes, a bloated heavyweight division mercifully gives way to the lower ranks.

Tonight at 7 p.m., HBO gives the lightweights their fair shake when, in a first, the pay-cable channel will headline a double bill of lower-division fighters.

The card features World Boxing Council featherweight champion Kevin Kelley (40-0, 29 KOs) in a mandatory defense against No. 1 contender Alejandro Gonzalez (33-2, 23 KOs), and International Boxing Federation bantamweight champion Orlando Canizales (38-1-1, 28 KOs), who is moving up to 122 pounds to challenge Wilfredo Vazquez (41-6-3, 32 KOs) for his World Boxing Assn. junior-featherweight belt.

“It’s a great honor that they’re willing to put the little guys on,” Canizales said. “I think I deserve a shot on HBO.”

Canizales?

The Texan has dominated boxing as no other the last 6 1/2 years. He has made a record 16 consecutive defenses of his bantamweight title and is consistently rated as one of the world’s best fighters, pound-for-pound.

Canizales is moving up to 122 because he says he can’t make weight anymore at 118. He was also running out of challengers.

Until now, Canizales and Kelley have largely been ignored by the sport’s money generators: cable and pay-per-view. “People don’t want to see heavyweights, what people want to see is great fights,” Kelley, the Brooklyn-based southpaw, said. “I try to put on great fights. Too many fighters at light weights have been silent too long. We have to cut into the heavyweight picture, cut into their pie.”

Kelley certainly talks a good game. He said there are 10 billboards devoted to him in New York City.

“It’s Kevin Mania, they’re going crazy,” Kelley said. “I want the kids to relate to me the way they relate to (Michael) Jordan.”

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Boxing Notes

Main Events promoter Dan Duva has secured two of his three ex-heavyweight champions for a proposed “Fantasy Night” card scheduled for March 18 in Las Vegas. Michael Moorer, who lost his World Boxing Assn. and International Boxing Federation belts to George Foreman, would share the bill with Lennox Lewis, the recently dethroned World Boxing Council title holder.

Duva is attempting to make it a triple-header with Evander Holyfield, who is still weighing his options after receiving medical clearance to resume his boxing career after a brief retirement because of a minor heart ailment.

Dan Goossen, manager for Long Beach heavyweight Jeremy Williams, said he proposed that Williams fight Moorer on the Duva card but that the Duva camp rejected the offer.

The WBC has granted former junior-middleweight champion Terry Norris a rematch with Luis Santana. Norris was stripped of his title Nov. 12 for throwing a punch to the back of Santana’s head. Norris wanted the bout ruled a no-contest, but the WBC rejected that petition. . . . Forum Boxing will stage about 20 shows this year, beginning Monday. The Grand Olympic Auditorium, which struggled in its first year of its reopening, will reduce its number of shows to a minimum of 10. The Grand Olympic’s original contract with Top Rank Inc. called for 25 shows per year, but those terms were renegotiated. Forum Boxing is working on a late-March show that would feature WBC and IBF light-flyweight champion Humberto (Chiquita) Gonzalez in his first defense since defeating Michael Carbajal. The card, to be held either at Las Vegas or the Pond, would match Gonzalez against Scotty Olson. The card would also feature World Boxing Assn. junior-lightweight champion Genaro Hernandez in a title defense against Jorge Paez.

Ted Luckow, promoter of the monthly Irvine Marriott shows the last two years, has sold the show back to former event promoter Roy Englebrecht. The Irvine shows will be held on the last Thursday each month, beginning Jan. 26.