Columnist Dean Juipe: Rap star failing in new venture

Dean Juipe

Tuesday, Aug. 8, 2000 | 10 a.m.

Dean Juipe's column appears Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. His boxing notebook appears Thursday. Reach him at juipe@lasvegassun.com or 259-4084.

James Prince is doing his best to ruin one promising boxing career. Now there's reason to believe he's trying to spoil a second one.

Prince, a rap artist and a would-be boxing entrepreneur, has managed WBC junior lightweight champion Floyd Mayweather Jr. since the first of the year and recently signed a pact with James Page, the WBA welterweight champion. But Page, through Monday at least, is virtually missing in action despite being scheduled to fight at the Paris Las Vegas resort Saturday as part of the Evander Holyfield vs. John Ruiz undercard.

"He's being very foolish," said Don King Productions' matchmaker Bobby Goodman, referring to Page's vanishing act. "He's taking bad advice from James Prince.

"Prince has already screwed up one budding superstar and I'd hate to see him do it to another young man with talent."

Prince's impact on Mayweather -- and now, apparently, Page -- is a textbook example of what not to do when guiding a fighter's career. Since Prince became affiliated with Mayweather the Las Vegan has turned down a $12 million contract from HBO, has fought only once this year, has nothing scheduled, and has alienated his father and each and every one of his benefactors.

Now Page, a Californian, is on a similar course and it's at least as damaging, given that he's approaching 30 and, arguably, is fortunate to be a legitimate world champion given his lack of daunting power (and charisma).

He's 25-3 and hasn't fought in 13 months. His uncooperativeness could cost him a small fortune and it will cost him the WBA title in the event he fails to show and defend it Saturday against Andrew Lewis.

Page is slated to make $112,000 for the fight but Prince has convinced him it's not enough. Hence, neither is in town and Goodman says "Page needs to be here but I don't even know how to contact him."

Take a bow, James Prince.

"He doesn't know the boxing business," Goodman lamented. "He could give his guys plenty of insight into being a gangsta rapper, but he doesn't know anything about boxing."

DKP representatives have tried going around Prince to reach Page, but it hasn't been successful. "I was told his mother said he wasn't fighting," Goodman said. "But I haven't talked to Page about it and I've never talked to Prince."

It would have been better for Page if he had never talked to Prince. Instead, he fell for a spiel that likely promises riches while delivering little more than unemployment checks.

It's easy to speculate on the subject matter when Prince sits down with a fighter: "The people you have around you are just using you and they can't be trusted. Sign with me and we'll stand up to them and make you an even richer man."

Yet Prince is guilty of the very indiscretions he pins on others. Worse yet, his fighters are idling during the prime of their boxing careers, which is a very narrow window at that.

If Page is skipping Saturday's fight because he feels he's underpaid, he's not only misinformed but out of line. Prince is doing him a disservice.

Page, to quote actor Leslie Nielsen in the movie "Airplane," is being played like a violin at the annual saps' convention.