Time’s Up for Holmes : Boxing: McCall wins decision. Seldon takes vacant WBA title, Chavez cruises, and Norris is disqualified again.

Unlike another 45-year-old boxer, Larry Holmes could not suspend time, land two punches and win over middle-aged America.

Most of the time, things go as expected. Oliver McCall, 29, wore down his older opponent in the later rounds and retained his World Boxing Council heavyweight title Saturday night with a unanimous decision over Holmes before 8,167 at Caesars Palace.

It was a cagey, veteran effort by Holmes, who used all his tricks to keep the fight closer than some expected.

The three judges scored it 114-113, 115-114 and 115-112.

Holmes was in better shape through nine rounds than George Foreman was last November before he decked Michael Moorer in the 10th to become the oldest heavyweight champion in history.

“I felt it was a hard fight,” McCall said. “He came out more courageous than George Foreman. I had the better jab and felt that was the difference.”

McCall (26-5, 18 KOs) took control of the fight in the ninth round, as he pounded Holmes in the corner and kept him there.

Holmes (61-5, 40 KOs) was slow to rise from his stool in the 10th, and McCall opened a cut under Holmes’ left cheek.

Unlike Foreman, there were no miracle punches in Holmes’ hip pocket.

In the arena in which he won the heavyweight title in 1978, Holmes announced his exit from boxing.

“This is a good way for me to go out,” he said. “It’s my last fight.”

Earlier, in a bout to fill the vacant World Boxing Assn. title, Bruce Seldon upset Tony Tucker with a seventh-round technical knockout.

In other bouts, Julio Cesar Chavez, Felix Trinidad and Luis Santana all retained their championships, but it certainly wasn’t easy for Santana.

On the advice of Dr. Flip Homansky, referee Mills Lane stopped the Seldon-Tucker bout at the end of seven rounds with Seldon leading on all three judges’ scorecards (68-65, 67-66, 67-66).

Tucker’s left eye, peppered with jabs throughout, began to close in Round 3 and got worse as the fight progressed.

“The eye was a concern; he lost vision, totally,” Homansky said.

Homansky was also concerned about a possible nasal fracture.

Tucker disagreed.

“That is not right,” he said. “Don’t stop the fight. Please don’t stop the fight. Don’t let them do this to me. Not like this.”

Seldon’s best rounds were the fourth and fifth, when he used a combination of left jabs and body shots with great effect.

Tucker had his best moments in the sixth, as though sensing his eye was not going to hold up for the entire fight.

Seldon, who served four years in prison for armed robbery and survived an embarrassing one-round knockout to Riddick Bowe in 1991, jumped around the ring like a man who never dreamed this night would come.

At 15, Seldon (32-3, 28 KOs) was convicted of robbing a casino boss in Atlantic City and learned to fight during his four-year stint at Annandale Prison in south New Jersey.

It was only the third career loss for Tucker (52-3, 43 KOs), the WBA’s No. 1 contender. He was awarded the title fight when the organization stripped Foreman of the title for not making a mandatory defense.

All three of Tucker’s losses have come in championship fights. He lost his International Boxing Federation title to Mike Tyson in 1987 and, in 1993, Tucker lost a WBC championship fight to Lennox Lewis.

In other title fights:

--Chavez, in his typical, methodical, relentless fashion, dominated Italian Giovanni Parisi from start to finish, winning a unanimous 12-round decision. One judge had Chavez winning every round in retaining his WBC super-lightweight title.

“I thought it was a good fight, but Parisi isn’t in my caliber,” Chavez said.

Chavez (94-1-1) set the tone when he knocked Parisi (29-2, 21 KOs) down with a straight left jab in the second round. Parisi popped up quickly, but was on the receiving end the rest of the night.

In the latter rounds, Chavez clowned with Parisi and baited him to put up a fight. Parisi could not.

--Santana, in the night’s most bizarre fight, once again won the WBC super-welterweight title from Terry Norris while being carried from the ring on a stretcher.

Norris lost the belt to Santana last Nov. 12 in Mexico City when he threw an illegal punch to the back of Santana’s head in the fifth round.

Norris (38-6, 23 KOs) was sure Santana (40-15-2, 29 KOs) had faked the injury and filed a protest. The WBC ordered a rematch.

Guess what?

In an inexplicable move after the bell rang to end Round 3, Norris stepped past referee Kenny Bayliss and struck Santana in the head.

Santana dropped to the canvas and was carried off again as champion.

He was taken to Valley Hospital and held overnight for observation, but was reported to be fine.

Norris said he didn’t hear the bell as Bayliss--his back facing Norris--attended to a wobbly Santana near the end of the round.

“The referee told me to go ahead,” Norris, 27, said. “I was ready and hit him with a good shot. I didn’t hear the bell. I thought they had stopped the fight.”

Norris may have been the only one in the crowd not to hear the bell.

And why, if Norris thought the fight was over, did he throw a punch?

“I think Norris should be banned for life from boxing,” said Grant Elvis Phillips, Santana’s manager. “To win this way, I am sick to my stomach.”

WBC President Jose Sulaiman said he would review tapes of the fight and make a decision.

Santana, 34, became the first boxer to win consecutive decisions by disqualification since French middleweight Marcel Thil in 1931.

--Trinidad, the 22-year-old sensation from Puerto Rico, had little trouble retaining his IBF welterweight title as he knocked Roger Turner out at 2:28 of the second round.

The TKO came seconds after Trinidad dropped Turner with a quick left hook.

Trinidad improved to 26-0 with 22 KOs. Turner, 34, from Indianapolis, fell to 29-3 in his first title bout.