ANALYSIS/OPINION:
Ross Molovinsky and his father, Gene, have been putting on quality boxing shows locally for years with their Keystone Boxing promotion. They sponsored one recently at Rosecroft Raceway, and on Saturday night, hosted one at The Sphinx Club, a hidden, old-school gem on K Street in the District that could wind up being Washington?s version of the legendary Blue Horizon in Philadelphia.
They?ve been fighting the good fight for boxing, so excuse them if they are a little frustrated that suddenly people are acting like boxing rose from the grave with the anticipation of the Floyd Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao megafight scheduled for May 2 in Las Vegas.
?Being in the boxing business, all the Mayweather-Pacquiao talk gets on my nerves,? Ross Molovinsky said. ?I?d rather talk about other fighters and up-and-coming guys, and that?s only because of being so close to the business, day-in and day-out. So, I tend to be short when I talk about it. We were toying around with the idea in our business of having a surcharge if anyone asks us about about Mayweather-Pacqiuao.?
Gary Williams, the keeper of the flame of local boxing with his web site, ?Boxing Along the Beltway,? knows how Ross Molovinsky feels ? the notion that boxing is back, when, for the Molovinskys, Williams and others, it?s been alive and well all along.
?It might give boxing a bump,? Williams said. ?But here in D.C., we?ve been running boxing shows all along without a Mayweather-Pacquiao fight. We?ve always been here, and always had a regular, hardcore fan base. So, I don?t know if it will mean a whole lot. That?s a whole different level. We know where we are with boxing in Washington, and we?re in good shape.?
