Columnist Dean Juipe: Trinidad, Vargas fight hurt by Tua

Dean Juipe

Wednesday, Nov. 29, 2000 | 10:51 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.

Sitting a few rows back from the ring, a cap on his head as if in disguise, David Tua appeared infinitely forlorn.

Maybe it's nothing permanent, yet his look had its telltale aspects.

Tua, taking in last Sunday's boxing card at the Regent Las Vegas, was reserved and -- juxtaposed to the vibrant personality he exhibited only a few weeks earlier -- inhibited. It didn't help when he was introduced to the crowd and was on the receiving end of a good many boos.

While several youngsters found him and crowded their way into his presence, it was interesting that adults were staying away in droves. It was obvious he had alienated the sport's primary supporters.

Boxing fans are an extremely resilient lot by nature, and they inevitably bounce back over time. But Tua is taking part of the brunt of their current displeasure for his lack of effort in a one-sided loss to heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis Nov. 11 at Mandalay Bay, and Felix Trinidad and Fernando Vargas are taking the other.

Trinidad and Vargas, fighting Saturday at Mandalay Bay, are not -- as yet -- attracting the type of crowd promoters expected. Ticket sales are far from brisk and the fairly steep prices, $50 to $1,500, are only part of the reason.

Never mind that the junior middleweights will almost certainly put on a good show and that their fight is apt to stretch beyond interesting to captivating, they have the misfortune of following Tua.

Fans sucked it up for Tua vs. Lewis and the fight did well at the gate and acceptable on pay-per-view in spite of the fact it followed something of a clunker in Mike Tyson vs. Andrew Golota. The latter fight, Oct. 20 in suburban Detroit, bombed when Golota threw in the towel after only a token effort.

So between Tua and Golota, boxing fans are even more skeptical than usual. These pay-per-view fights are expensive -- $45 to $50 -- and when the bouts turn out to be disappointing there's a lingering and sour aftertaste.

It's presently being felt by Trinidad, Vargas and the people who were hoping to make money on matching the reigning champions.

Cox Communications in Las Vegas has already announced the fight will be blacked out and will not be available locally on pay-per-view (barring a last-minute decision otherwise). That's a result of the lagging ticket sales at the live site.

And for those who enjoy the closed-circuit setting of watching a big fight in the showroom of a Las Vegas casino, access will be more limited than it was for either the Tyson or the Lewis fights. Whereas Lewis vs. Tua was shown on closed circuit at 17 Las Vegas locations, Trinidad vs. Vargas will be available at only eight.

It's also said that the calendar is working against Trinidad and Vargas in that the holiday season lessens the interest in big fights like this one and that the rodeo limits room availabilities.

Maybe that's true to a limited extent, although it seems to me there's a better explanation. David Tua, all talk and no heart, has cut into the profits Trinidad and Vargas were expecting.

No wonder the Samoan was trying to hide the other night. If either Trinidad or Vargas had been there, they would have sought him out and beat him up.