THINKING OUT OF THE BOX

By Michael Swann

HATS OFF TO LARRY

Larry Hazzard, the New Jersey State Athletic Control Board commissioner is among the most progressive commission leaders in boxing today, a no-nonsense type of guy who is unafraid to exercise his authority and take the bull by the horns. Hazzard recently gave a demonstration of his willingness to assert himself in the recent Arturo Gatti-Alfonso Gomez fight. In the seventh round Gatti was getting hit with everything but a lead pipe before slumping helplessly to the canvas. With no response from Gatti’s trainer, Mickey Ward, and with referee Randy Neuman engaged in his 10 count, Hazzard jumped into the ring and stopped the fight himself.

Hazzard makes no apologies for his actions, saying, “I saw the referee start the counting in a situation where a count wasn’t necessary to me. Who’s to say he’s not going to let it continue? I’m not going to take the chance of Gatti getting hit with one more punch.

“I think the way to be is pro-active. The fact that I was a referee gives me a lot of confidence that some of the commissioners possibly don’t have.”

It his pro-active nature that has remarkably removed the red tape and made instant replay a part of the New Jersey boxing program. Around the first of the year the Control Board issued a press release announcing that the use of instant replay would be authorized for boxing, mixed martial arts, and kickboxing.

But the policy statement showed some cracks in logic as it was written. Potential snags were found in the text such as, “Instant replay will be utilized at the discretion of the lead promoter… This agency does not have the technology readily available, so it will be up to the promoter to provide the necessary equipment.”

In other words, the lead promoter would have to cough up an estimated $5,000 for the equipment, and would also be required to share it with the opposite corner, not a likely scenario.

Another problem was the potential for stalling. The program, as written, called for the chief second to approach the commissioner during or at the end of the round in question to review an issue under protest. This could possibly interrupt the fight because the commissioner would have three minutes to render a decision, according to the written policy. This could potentially give a crafty chief second a golden opportunity to buy time for a hurt fighter to clear his head under the right set of circumstances. And, there was to be no limit to the number of challenges, which not only would provide such temptation, but would seriously impair the flow of a fight.

The technology would be used to review:
1) Knockdowns vs. slips
2) Accidental vs. intentional fouls
3) If a cut was the result of a punch
4) If the fighter beat the count
5) Low blows
6) If a punch landed before the bell rang

There is so much on the line today for fighters, who in this day and age have so few opportunities to break out into the big time. A bad call on the above items can be devastating to a fighter’s career, and in some high profile cases millions of dollars may be at stake. Yet after several months, nothing has been heard from New Jersey regarding the use of instant replay.

Hazzard, true to form, has already been all over this since its inception. Without great fanfare he has used it at all major events that have taken place in New Jersey this year.

“I’ve never had to enforce it but I’ve been prepared to use it if the situation arose,” he explained. “You see there’s a misconception about this. When there’s an HBO show or whatever, there’s always been a mechanism. In between rounds when you’re sitting at home you see the replay right there, and I rely on that.

“It’s not the way it was presented. You know you put something down on paper, and then you have to self-structure it to make it do-able. If you start dissecting everything, you’re going to have a bigger problem than it really is. When we start explaining it to everybody, they ask, ‘Well, what about this?’ Then you say that’s not the issue and they make it the issue.

“How many times have you sat at home, a guy gets hit, he goes down, and they show the replay between rounds? It doesn’t take three minutes. By the time the round ends, it’s right there. You don’t need (extra equipment). I’ve been trying to explain it from the beginning. You can make the decision in 30 seconds.

“Everyone is aware that we have instant replay. But even if they don’t protest it, if I see it and it needs correcting I’m going to do it anyway without a protest. If a guy gets hit and goes down and the referee calls it a slip, I’m going to overrule it.”

Hazzard believes that the first time it happens that he uses it, instant replay will receive the publicity that it has lacked thus far:

“I’m not looking forward to using it, but the first time I do it’ll become front page news. That’s the way it is.”

Hazzard didn’t take the negatives that were written into the policy and just roll over. Some smaller, non televised cards possibly won’t have the same equipment available, and so for a very few the $5,000 cost might make it prohibitive, but Hazzard has made the best use of his resources and has made a workable program out of a nightmarish original presentation. He has succeeded in making chicken salad out of chicken fat, and every state in the country could well follow his lead.

It’s not costing the state or the promoter, it’s designed to be decided within seconds following the end of the round, and with Hazzard in charge, there is little chance for abuse.

Nick Lembo, council for the New Jersey Athletic Control Board, adds that the replay has been used in all three MMA cards in the state this year. In one instance, the promoter himself did pay for the equipment in a non televised show.

“You might not need it 99 times,” Lembo said. “But on the 100th time, someone’s career is at stake.”

“THE DIVINE MISS LOVELINESS”

That was how Don King described Kathy Duva last week at the New York press conference on the media tour to promote the Fernando Vargas-Ricardo Mayorga fight, to be held on September 8. Presumably King’s introduction was prior to her donning a lacrosse helmet when the two fighters squared off for a photo staredown, separated by Plexiglas. This was a reminder of their LA brawl, staged or otherwise to hype the fight, in which Duva was literally caught in the middle. (Mayorga did suffer a cut under his right eye.) My only comment on this is that if Kathy Duva wore a lacrosse helmet every day, it would soon be a fashion statement.

A year after people began writing the requiem for her company, Main Events, Duva somehow keeps churning out profitable fights featuring such familiar but tired names as Evander Holyfield, Arturo Gatti, and now Vargas. And now she has Kermit Cintron as the centerpiece for the next generation of Main Event fighters as she continues to re-tool the operation. Make no mistake - this is a resourceful woman.

Last week a You Tube video of the Cintron left hook that starched Walter Matthysse surfaced and was receiving a considerable amount of attention on the Internet. Duva was quoted as saying that she was planning to take advantage of the medium for marketing. It only makes sense to capitalize on a signature moment from your stars to build up a future audience.

That’s why I was surprised to hear that HBO had the video removed for copyright infringement. It seemed rather short sighted for a company that was in the business of marketing fighters, particularly one that was very much interested in reaching a younger demographic.

Curious, I contacted Ms. Duva to inquire about her feelings on the matter. This is her response:

“Since HBO owns most of the rights to the Cintron fight for the next 11 ½ months, I will not criticize them for enforcing their rights. That is entirely their prerogative. If it were my prerogative, I might decide to handle it differently, but then again, I’m not HBO.

“As a rights holder myself, I am a bit conflicted about the burgeoning world of free video. On one hand, sites like You Tube are where you must go to find the young audience that boxing so desperately needs to attract. KO’s like Kermit’s breathe new life into the sport of boxing. The reaction to the posting on You Tube proved to me that young people would love boxing if they could only find it. (Or, perhaps, if boxing only found them!) On the other hand, HBO paid a lot of money for that knockout. I can understand why, from both a practical and a legal perspective, they must do everything in their power to protect and enforce their rights.

“We plan to produce short videos leading up to the Vargas-Mayorga fight, (our own version of 24/7, if you will), using footage that we and Don King Productions own and are free to distribute. We will arrange to place these clips on sites like You Tube. I suppose that this is, perhaps, the best way to make use of these services as marketing tools. I don’t know what kind of impact our videos will have, but I do believe that this form of marketing can be extraordinarily effective and hope that this will be the case for our event. At any rate, I expect that we will learn from the experience and continue to evolve. The way things are moving in the Internet world, lately, it seems that we will have to prepare for something completely new every six months!”

So it appears that there is at least one promoter out there who is looking to the future, ironically the very same one that everyone has buried as being the past. If Internet marketing proves to be successful, others will follow and if we’re not careful we might just crack into that younger demographic in spite of the corporate suits.

Larry Hazzard and Kathy Duva - two boxing heavyweights, both thinking out of the box to improve the game. Let’s hope that such forward thinking is infectious.