Antonio Curtis will be among the most interested observers of Saturday night’s showdown between Marco Antonio Barrera and Juan Manuel Marquez at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. During his tenure (1984-99) as the matchmaker at the now defunct Forum Boxing, Inc., he helped develop both fighters as young prospects as they matured into world-class performers.
To him, this is Forum Boxing’s last hurrah.
“Two weeks ago I watched the fight between Rafael Marquez and Israel Vazquez, two kids that I brought up as youngsters. I’m watching the fight and I feel bad for Vazquez, happy for Marquez. But I was really hurt for Vazquez because it’s two good kids, and it’s the same way with Saturday night. I’ll be watching that fight. I won’t be rooting for anyone. I wish that both of them can win.”
Forum Boxing, which was owned by Jerry Buss, was a staple of the west coast boxing scene for years. With their bi-monthly Monday night shows at the Great Western Forum, they regularly had well-contested tournaments, featured great rivalries like the trilogy between Daniel Zaragoza and Paul Banke, and promoted Mexican stalwarts like Humberto Gonzalez. Barrera was their last great fighter.
In the early 90’s, Curtis was tipped off to ‘the Baby Faced Assassin’ by a Forum colleague.
“Even before the first time I saw Barrera, Carlos Avilas, he was doing a fight in Mexico and he said, ‘Tony, I saw a kid named Marco Antonio Barrera. At the time he was like 12-0 and he said, ‘He’s the type of fighter that you like. He’s your type of fighter.’ I go, ‘Oh, yeah?'”
Not too long after he would see Barrera perform on a Spanish network.
“He fought some kid three weeks after and he knocked the kid out,” said Curtis of the then jr. bantamweight banger from Mexico City. “At the time I was doing a 115-pound tournament and I contacted Armando Rayon in Mexico, I called him about this kid. He said, ‘Well, I’m going to talk to his dad.’ He talked to him and his trainer and they wanted to put him in the tournament. But when they sent in their papers I found out he was only 17 years old. So I couldn’t do anything.”
But soon, Barrera would come back into his life.
“About a year passed and somehow he and Ricardo Maldonado got together and he said, “I got a kid named Marco Antonio Barrera. He’s a helluva fighter,'” recalled Curtis of the then-influential manager who consistently supplied talent to the Forum. “I said, ‘I know who the kid is.’ He said, ‘I’m going to sign him up. Would you want to bring him here and use him?’ I said, ‘Hell, yeah! I tried to get him for the tournament.’ He probably would’ve won that 115-pound tournament.”
In November of 1992, Barrera would make his Inglewood debut by stopping Esteban Ayala in four. After one more outing to close out the year, he was kept active by the Forum, with six bouts in 1993 (alternating between the Forum and Mexico) and another six bouts the following year, when he’d start to perform in Las Vegas. His final bout of 1994 came as the main event performer on a local station in Southern California, KCAL9, which had a regularly televised series with Forum Boxing.
It was then that he truly opened Curtis’ eyes.
“I knew he was something special, but the fight that really convinced me was when he fought Eddie Cook on KCAL. Cook put him through a test, Cook extended him, hit him. Before he was doing all the hitting, this time Cook put it to him and he answered back. That was when I knew,” explained Curtis. Barrera would stop the gutsy Cook in eight exciting heats. “I thought he was ready to fight anybody. After that fight I would not hesitate to put him with anybody.”
In 1995, he would continue to climb up the ladder in defeating Daniel Jimenez (to win the WBO jr. featherweight title), Frankie Toledo, Mauricio Diaz, Agapito Sanchez and Eddie Croft. A solid crew of veterans.
Then to kick off his seventh year as a professional fighter (at a ripe old age of 22) a bold leap would be taken.
Kennedy McKinney.
“That was the first ‘Boxing After Dark’ show,'” said Curtis of that bout, which took place in February of 1996 at the Great Western Forum, for what turned out to be a historic night of boxing.
“We were approached by Lou DiBella, that they wanted to start a new creation, ‘Boxing After Dark’ and he says, ‘Well, we got Kennedy McKinney’, who at the time, of course, HBO was pushing. And they called and said, ‘Are you interested in putting in Barrera?’ We knew it was going to be a tough fight for Barrera. I called Maldonado and said, ‘There’s a new thing starting, ‘Boxing After Dark’. They want us to do the first show and they want to put Barrera in there but they want us to fight McKinney. Maldonado didn’t hesitate to say yeah.”
McKinney, a former U.S. Olympian, was not only a skilled boxer, but a guy who could crack with both hands. Having already built a sizable fan-base in the Latino-rich Southern California region, this was a risky proposition. Many others would’ve shied away from the assignment.
“I was surprised, I was really surprised and Marco took the fight,” Curtis said. “Because I was hesitant about putting him in there with Kennedy. He had just started fighting at 122 at the time. He had maybe two, three fights at 122 and we stepped him up with a guy who could knock a brick wall down with a left-hook or right-hand.”
In a stirring affair that set the tone for HBO’s late night series, Barrera would overcome a trip to the canvas by knocking down the courageous McKinney five times before this classic bout was waved off in the 12th and final round.
The rest as they say, is history. Outside of a hiccup or two (versus the likes of Junior Jones and Manny Pacquiao), Barrera became one of the generation’s best prizefighters. He would engage in an unforgettable three fight series with Erik Morales (winning two), and he would expose Naseem Hamed, in addition to winning titles at 126 and 130 pounds and earning pound-for-pound accolades.
His first-class flight to Canastota is already booked.
The same can not be said- at least not yet- for Marquez, who need a win over a Barrera to validate a career, which is accomplished, but at the same time disappointing.
“When we got together with Juan Manuel he had about three, four, five fights,” Curtis remembers. “I found out about him because he was sparring with Daniel Zaragoza. Zaragoza was Nacho Beristain’s guy, he was the breadwinner at the time. I was in Mexico City for a Julio Cesar Chavez fight and I saw him spar for the first time. I went by the Romanza Gym that Nacho has. And I saw him spar with Zaragoza and he was a six-round fighter and he gave Zaragoza all the hell he wanted. So Nacho said, ‘Well, Tony, I’m going to get a visa for this kid. Could you get him on some cards?’ So that’s what we did, we brought him on a card.”
Marquez would make his initial foray at the former home of the Los Angeles Lakers and Kings in January of 1995, halting Martin Ochoa in one round. Four bouts later he struggled and was downright lucky to beat Julian Wheeler with the aid of some questionable officiating. Chalk it up to a young fighter learning some lessons against a slick, crafty veteran. But in April of 1996, he would begin to hit his stride.
“When I really thought a lot of him is when I put him in his first main event against the ex-WBA champion, Julio Gervacio,” said Curtis of that bout at the Anaheim Pond. On that bill he actually shared co-main event status with Nestor Garza, a hot prospect at the time, who eventually held a version of the 122-pound title for a short spell. “He fought him into the eighth round and then he knocked him out with style. I thought that was his toughest test. I said, ‘Well, this kid can go places.”
After a cadre of career-developing wins, by 1999 he had earned the top spot in the WBO featherweight rankings. A title shot loomed. Only problem? The title was held by Hamed, a cash-cow for an organization who was intent on not taking him to any slaughterhouse.
As Marquez languished as the top contender, the WBO hemmed and hawed and did everything in their power to deny him his rightful shot at the belt.
“That was really frustrating for me; that was frustrating for Forum Boxing because of all the work that we did,” Curtis would say. “We were the number one contender for two years. Paco Valcarcel (the WBO president) gave us all the dance. They made us come over to Puerto Rico. They were supposed to have what you call an ‘executive committee meeting.’ We went down there and we presented our case. It was a kangaroo court.”
Usually, when a sanctioning body convenes a group, it’s usually an organized mugging. And in this case, all the usual machinations were in place to protect ‘the Prince’. The WBO would go against their own regulations – and then create new ones – to make sure Hamed would not be in the same ring as Marquez. It was eventually ruled that a unification bout would take precedence over a mandatory challenger.
So how did Hamed end up fighting Augie Sanchez (a non-titlist) in the summer of 2000 instead of Marquez? While he was slated to face Daniel Jimenez around the same time?
“When they said they were going to make a unification, I forgot who the hell they were supposed to be fighting. What happened is this, as soon as they told us no, we took another fight. As soon as we took another fight, then they called us when we had already signed for another fight and then they wanted us to fight Hamed,” Curtis recalled, of those events. “Now, I wanted to pull that fight, to fight Hamed. But Nacho said no. He would’ve gotten a half-million for the fight and Nacho turned that fight down.”
It would one of many decision made by Beristain the manager that would be questioned. Many believe that Marquez’s toughest opposition has been his own management.
“Yes,” agreed Curtis, who is actually very fond of Beristain. “He’s been tougher than Hamed, Barrera or whoever else he could fight. He’s made some bad decisions, but he thought he was right. He has convictions so I can’t get mad at him. I won’t criticize him. But I disagreed with him about some of the decisions he made. But it’s not only him, it takes two and Juan Manuel went along with him.”
Forum Boxing’s last show at their arena would take place in 1999, as Buss decided to stop funding the operation. With that, while they continued to represent Barrera through 2003, other fighters were let go, like Marquez.
“We didn’t ask him for a nickel. John Jackson (the president of Forum Boxing) released him, which I didn’t agree with. But then John wanted to. He said, ‘Tony, the only thing we can offer right now is KCAL fights and then we’d be doing him an injustice to keep him. We only had the KCAL shows, the arena was sold.”
By 2001, Marquez would be fighting under the Top Rank banner, where he would go on to win world titles, but outside of a hotly contested draw against Manny Pacquiao in 2004, defining events have eluded him.
Curtis was stunned that Barrera-Marquez was consummated.
“I’m very surprised,” he would admit, “because after the last fight, Marquez fought in November, I never thought that fight would happen because Barrera said he didn’t want to fight no other Mexican. I was surprised they took the fight. And the reason they took the fight was because Pacquiao is not available – he’s with Top Rank – and they have whatever fights they have between them. So that left Barrera no options if he wants to get paid.”
The Forum’s association with Barrera would come to an end after April of 2003.
Curtis would reveal: “Our last fight with Forum Boxing and Barrera, the opponent they asked for was Pacquiao. And we said, ‘No, make Pacquiao for pay-per-view. Build him up and make him pay-per-view and everybody gets paid.’ And they said OK and we ended up fighting Kevin Kelley.
“The next fight De La Hoya and them, they got Barrera. The first fight, they got him knocked off.”
Against none other than ‘the Pac Man’.
“When we had Barrera, there were two guys that we didn’t have on our list – Juan Manuel Marquez and the other one was Manny Pacquaio. And it wasn’t because I didn’t feel Barrera could beat them but I think their styles, he wasn’t going to look too good fighting these guys.”
TAYLOR TIME
Early Thursday afternoon, Bob Arum was on his soapbox trying to coax Jermain Taylor into fighting stiffer opposition.
“Jermain Taylor is recognized as the universal middleweight champion. There’s a responsibility that goes with that – and that’s to fight the best middleweights out there,” he would say. “And there are three guys who fall into that category: Kelly Pavlik (whom he promotes), Edison Miranda and Arthur Abraham. And if HBO truly wants competitive, entertaining fights it should refuse to buy a Jermain Taylor fight unless it’s against one of those three guys.
“Now, whoever it is, I mean I know some will say, ‘Well, you’re pushing Pavlik.’ No, no, I would accept him fighting Miranda or Abraham, but it should be a legitimate top middleweight. And it’s in somebody’s mouth to say, ‘Well, who the hell has Pavlik fought? Who has Miranda fought?’ Well, if they’re that easy, why don’t you fight them because everybody is clamoring for you to fight the best middleweights out there and they’re considered the best middleweights out there. So the only implication that somebody can draw from that is that somebody in Taylor’s camp is afraid to fight those guys.”
Arum doesn’t believe its Lou DiBella or Carl Moretti. Which would mean it’s none other than Al Haymon, who really seems to be running the show there.
“Now,” Arum continued, “what does HBO do? If they want a competitive fight, if they don’t want boxing to continue to die, refuse to put Jermain Taylor on unless he fights one of those guys.”
HBO’s ratings have been so low recently that Vern Troyer has to kneel down to spot them.
So does Cory Spinks not fit the bill?
“It’s a joke!!! Look, lets be honest about it, if Jermain Taylor fights Cory Spinks and you ask 50 boxing experts, 50 would say there’s one winner. There’s only one winner! One guy is half the size of the other. If he fights Miranda or Pavlik, maybe 15 to 25-percent of the experts would take the challenger. It’s still great odds for the champion. But at least people would give the challenger a chance and it’s likely to be a very good fight.”
Again, once again, maybe this shows once and for all why networks need to conduct themselves like programmers and not promoters and get out of the business, “Of long term contracts, 100-percent!!!” interrupted Arum. “And there are people now at HBO who agree with that. Who realize that the long-term contracts and the non-licensed people who hover around these guys, they’re the ones who are hurting boxing and so that it is not the sport that it was even a few years ago.”
Hey, man, that’s pretty harsh statement if you ask me.
DiBella, who told Maxboxing that he attempted on Thursday to make fights for Taylor involving Felix Sturm, Javier Castillejo and Abraham among others, has stated that May 19th is a Jermain Taylor ‘date’.
Again, why give ‘dates’? Why not fill a slot with a fight? One that is compelling and competitive?
“Absolutely, because if you got a date and you got a long-term contract, you’re going to look to fight the easiest guy possible for the money. That’s human nature,” said Arum, who took some pretty good HBO money for the last Miguel Cotto bout against Oktay Urkal, which drew an abysmal rating. “You’re not looking for the long-term picture for the betterment of the sport or that people are getting sick and tired and the viewership keeps going down. You don’t care about that!!! You want the most money for the least risk.”
When he found out later in the afternoon that the HBO brass had greenlighted Spinks, Arum would respond by saying: “Oy vey.”
IZZY
On Thursday afternoon Israel Vazquez would go through a 90-minute surgery in Beverly Hills under the knife of Dr. Robert Kotler to repair the damage done to his nose during his March 3rd bout versus Rafael Marquez.
Frank Espinoza, his manager, would say the prognosis was optimistic from the doctor, “He said he didn’t have to work on the outside bone. It was the inside bone that was injured. He cleared out some cartilage and some of the old blood. He’ll be able to breathe a lot better. He’ll notice the difference, tremendously.”
Vazquez could be back in the gym within the next four-to-six weeks, putting him on track for a rematch with Marquez by the early fall. As for Marquez’s desire to perhaps take an optional defense beforehand, the contract states that neither fighter can take another bout – except for a return bout – within the next ten months.
GOOD BOUTS
It’s a busy weekend of boxing, with some intriguing matchups. Telefutura features one of the game’s most underrated titlists, WBA 122-pound champion Celestino Caballero, who faces the talented Ricardo Castillo, the younger sibling of standout Jose Luis.
Then, the MSG Network, would give boxing fans a treat by picking up the rights to show the cruiserweight championship between O’Neil Bell and Jean-Marc Mormeck, who threw plenty of leather in their initial encounter in January of 2006.
APRIL SHOWTIME
Tony Holden, who will be assisting Gary Shaw on his April 7th show featuring Diego Corrales-Joshua Clottey, told Maxboxing that that event will take place at the Shrine Mosque in Springfield, Missouri.
No word if Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa, Maggie and the rest of those characters will be in attendance.
I hear that Showtime may not have an undercard bout for this telecast.
