Ruelas Wants to Fight Stars; Balboa Sees Them

Where’s a good screenwriter when you need one?

Failing to providing any of the excitement or suspense movie fans have come to expect, Rocky Balboa crumpled to the canvas Tuesday night, a knockout victim in the fifth round of a scheduled 10-rounder after taking a powerful body shot from the left hand of Rafael Ruelas.

That’s junior-welterweight Jaime “Rocky” Balboa, no relation in either size or stature to the fictional film fighter.

After finishing off Balboa in the main event at the Fantasy Springs Casino, Ruelas, the former International Boxing Federation lightweight champion, began dropping bigger names he’d like to share future billing with.

Such as Julio Cesar Chavez and Oscar De La Hoya.

This was the fourth consecutive victory for Ruelas (47-3, 37 knockouts) since he suffered devastating back-to-back losses to De La Hoya and George Scott in 1995.

The way Ruelas has it figured, he would fight Chavez, who lost a blockbuster match to De La Hoya last June, and the winner then would get a rematch with the World Boxing Council super-lightweight champion.

But that’s not the way Bob Arum, Chavez’s promoter, has it figured.

“Rafael is a nice kid,” Arum said, “but he’s not a viable contender.”

Dan Goossen, Ruelas’ manager, fired back.

“Nobody is a viable candidate unless Bob Arum has them under contract,” Goossen said.

Ruelas didn’t realize that the 34-year-old Balboa had such an impressive record. Even with the loss, he is 63-22-1 with 57 knockouts.

“I knew I had to be patient when I heard his record after I got into the ring,” Ruelas said.

Ruelas finally broke through in the fifth, peppering Balboa with a flurry of rights and lefts before finally flooring him. The fight was stopped at the 2:39 mark of that round.

In the first fight of the night, on a card staged before a meager 925 who were forced to sit outdoors with the temperature at 40 degrees, Paea Wolfgramm, silver medalist from Tonga in the super-heavyweight division at the 1996 Olympics, made his pro debut by stopping Jeff Kirk (4-2-1, three knockouts) 46 seconds into the first round of a scheduled four-rounder. Wolfgramm weighed in at 325 pounds, 105 pounds more than his opponent.