Columnist Ron Kantowski: Arum not what’s wrong with boxing

Thursday, Aug. 17, 2000 | 10:02 a.m.

Ron Kantowski's column appears Thursday. Reach him at ron@lasvegassun.com or 259-4088.

Bob Arum is no angel.

In terms of a deep thought, that one won't have Jack Handey reaching for a life preserver. But when it comes to his stint in boxing purgatory, suffice it to say that Arum is going to spend less time in line than his fuzzy-haired partner in crim ... er, the boxing promoting business.

Call me insane, but I tend to form opinions of people in this business based on the way people treat me, with the following criteria serving as a guideline: A) Are you accessible and/or do you return phone calls? B) Do you have something interesting to say? And C) When I write something negative about you, is some guy named Milt going to flatten my nose or (worse) my tires?

In Arum's case, that's two yes votes and a no (so far). I'd rank him just behind former UNLV baseball coach Fred Dallimore near the top of my scorecard.

So yeah, I guess I'm kinda glad Arum was able to keep his promoter's license following his admission that he paid the International Boxing Federation $100,000 to have George Foreman's 1995 fight with Axel Schulz called a championship bout.

As for the fine he received during Wednesday's Nevada State Athletic Commission hearing, well, Arum's not going to have to rent out guest rooms because he's $125,000 short. Yet, the penalty was an all-time NSAC record. It showed the commission is concerned about its reputation, even if others will consider it little more than a slap on Arum's wrist (provided it's the one opposite the Rolex).

But has anybody not receiving graft in boxing ever considered that it could solve about 95 percent of its problems simply by abolishing its bogus sanctioning bodies? Wednesday's hearing even veered off in that direction before it was agreed that the three-lettered extortionists should be a topic for a future meeting.

As for an existing sport that could serve as the prototype for an honest boxing organization, what about college football? Like boxing, it's a sport without a playoff system that is driven by subjective rankings.

My first thought was that some guy with a big cigar should come down from Capitol Hill and assemble a panel of experts that would identify a champion from the 82 or so that are available in each weight class. The panel would then vote on positions 1-25, as they do in college football. It would be a lot like the old days when Ring Magazine condensed the original weight classes and the hyphenated ones into eight, and then took seriously the task of rating the fighters.

That's why when two guys in Ring's Top 10 squared off, you could assume it was legit. With only eight divisions, there would be fewer title fights, but they would all be big events. And Evander Holyfield and John Ruiz would never fight for the crown.

A colleague said that proposal would never work because in boxing, you couldn't find enough guys with integrity to form the voting panel.

He has a point. But I would counter that there's also a lot of money riding on college football. Yet when was the last time you read about a sportswriter taking a bribe to move Big State up a few notches in the poll?

The way it is now in boxing, the WBA could have Nebraska ranked No. 1, while the WBC may not have the Cornhuskers ranked at all.

And over there in a dark booth, Don King and Bob Arum could be having dinner with an IBF rep and some big-shot car dealer from Lincoln.