Halpern Is Odd Man Out of the Ring

Referee Mitch Halpern counted himself out Thursday night.

Only hours after the Nevada State Athletic Commission, in an extraordinary emergency session, refused to accede to the demands of the Mike Tyson camp that Halpern be replaced for Saturday night’s title fight against Evander Holyfield, Halpern himself made the decision to step out of the ring.

“I felt I was taking too much away,” Halpern said. “Not me personally, [but] the controversy was taking too much away from the fight.”

Replacing Halpern for tonight’s main event at the MGM Grand Garden will be Mills Lane.

“I think he showed some real class,” Lane said of Halpern. “He did what he thought he had to do, and you’ve got to respect him for that.”

Does Lane now feel any extra pressure because of Tyson’s demand to remove Halpern?

“I don’t take any crap from anybody,” said Lane, a Nevada district judge. “I do the best I can.”

Never in the history of Nevada boxing has a protest over the appointment of a referee been upheld. Nor was this one.

At least not on the surface.

Tyson’s promoter, Don King, and his co-managers, John Horne and Rory Holloway, had asked the commission Thursday to remove Halpern, the referee in Holyfield’s defeat of Tyson last November, because Tyson wanted a “fresh face” for the rematch. The commission voted down that request by a 4-1 vote.

But at 11:05 Thursday night, Halpern, a veteran of 38 championship bouts, called Marc Ratner, executive director of the commission, and said he wished to remove himself.

Ratner insisted that it was Halpern, not the Tyson camp or the commission, who made the final decision.

Ratner said Halpern, who would have received $10,000 for refereeing tonight’s bout, will get no money for stepping aside. But he will, apparently, get the next big Nevada bout as compensation.

“He’ll be back refereeing the next card,” Ratner said. “He’s just doing it for what he thinks are very noble reasons.

“I certainly wanted him to stay in the fight, but I respect his decision.”

The news of Halpern’s exit was greeted with joy by Tyson’s handlers, who had hinted that the fight might not happen if Halpern stayed firm, a threat no one took seriously considering Tyson would have lost a $30-million purse by dropping out.

“Sometime between dusk and dawn,” King said, “fairness prevailed.”

Fairness or pressure from the commission?

“We believed the commission would find a way to do the fair thing,” Horne said. “We have nothing against Mitch Halpern. We love Mitch Halpern and we would love to have him back in the future. This is about having the same referee back-to-back.

“I think the more Mitch Halpern thought about it, the more he thought, ‘Hey, I don’t want to be a sideshow to the biggest fight in history.’ ”

Holyfield reacted to the late switch to Lane with a shrug of his well-defined shoulders.

“It really doesn’t make a difference to me,” he said. “I know either ref is going to do the job. I totally believe Mills Lane has the experience to handle this fight. I think Mitch Halpern did a good job in the last fight, and there is no reason to think he couldn’t have done it this time. But it’s OK with me.”

Boxing historian Bert Sugar said the only case he can remember in which a referee was switched was for the second Gene Tunney-Jack Dempsey fight, in Chicago in 1927. The original referee, whose name has been long forgotten, was removed because of alleged ties to gangster Al Capone. The new referee, Dave Barry, was involved in a controversy of his own, allowing Tunney time to recover from a Dempsey knockdown via Barry’s famous long count. Tunney went on to win by decision.

Ratner is determined to see that Thursday’s events don’t become precedent in the state of Nevada.

“This was just an aberration,” Ratner said. “That’s all it was. . . . I believe we have four of the best refs [Halpern, Lane, Richard Steele and Joe Cortez],” Ratner said. “We are going to have personality conflicts, but it’s my job to communicate more with the camps. I’ll take the blame.”

Maybe Ratner takes the blame, but, in the end, it was Halpern who took the fall.