Columnist Dean Juipe: Las Vegas rivals Forbes, Juuko to fight — but in Indio, Calif.

Dean Juipe

Thursday, April 12, 2001 | 10:20 a.m.

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

Steve Forbes and Justin Juuko may not mean anything to the people in and around Indio, Calif., but they're highly regarded fighters in Las Vegas, in part because each has lived here for several years.

But Forbes -- the International Boxing Federation junior lightweight champ -- and Juuko are fighting April 22 in Indio, a puzzling decision given their Las Vegas ties.

They're paired on a Fox Sports Net card that also features Hector Camacho Jr. in a companion event.

For Forbes, it's the first defense of the championship he won Dec. 3 in Miami when he prevailed over John Brown with the vacant title at stake. Forbes won that fight by eighth round TKO when Brown was forced to call it quits due to a lacerated left eardrum that was bleeding profusely.

"Stevie is only going to get better," said his agent, Cameron Dunkin. "Before he fought Brown, he was saying 'Am I really fighting for a world title?' as if he wasn't sure he belonged at that level.

"But now he knows he belongs. He's a dangerous guy and the fact that he had so few amateur fights indicates he could continue improving."

Forbes is 19-1, albeit with only four wins by knockout.

Juuko is 35-4-1 with 26 KOs and coming off an impressive Jan. 21 victory in San Antonio over Antonio Ramirez. In that fight Juuko had Ramirez down twice before finishing him off in the ninth round.

"Juuko's a tough guy," Dunkin admitted. "He gave Diego Corrales a heck of a fight and he did well against Floyd Mayweather, too. He's a real professional, although I think Stevie will win."

Dunkin said promoter Dan Goossen of America Presents lobbied for Juuko to get the assignment after the man initially offered the bout -- former champion Roberto Garcia -- declined, citing financial reasons. He wanted more than FSN was willing to pay, and in spite of having just lost by knockout to Joel Casamayor (Jan. 6 at the Texas Station) he not only rejected the offer presented to him but said he would retire if nothing better came along.

That opened the door for Juuko, with Dunkin saying "Goossen just kept coming back to him and saying that he feels Justin needs this fight."

Should Forbes, who is training in Phoenix, defeat Juuko, he will face Brown for a second time as the IBF has reinstated the 22-8 veteran as its No. 1 challenger.

The autobiography has its moments although it completely omits Tillis' 1995-96 stay in Las Vegas when he trained here and worked as a representative for the Las Vegas Club's Sports Hall of Fame exhibit.

"He seemed like quite a nice guy and I liked him," said Brady Exber of the Las Vegas Club. "He was a funny guy."

Coincidental with the book's release, Tillis has launched a comeback at the age of 43 and is scheduled to fight Rob Calloway Friday in St. Joseph, Mo.

Tillis is 42-22 and hasn't fought since 1999.

His book has its flaws -- such as adding an apostrophe to Caesars Palace and the misspelling of the late gym-owner Johnny Tocco's name -- and it doesn't always show the subject in the best of lights. For instance, Tillis admits he broke his best friend's arm with a baseball bat as a kid; that he was sent to jail for failing to pay child support; and that he threw a 1991 fight to Tommy Morrison in Atlantic City.

Tillis also has the curious habit of referring to his first wife as "Jane Fonda" rather than by her actual name, and the tales of sex and womanizing are sometimes a bit overbearing.

As a fighter, Tillis can lay claim to having faced most of the great heavyweights of his era, including Morrison, Mike Tyson, Evander Holyfield, Tim Witherspoon, Mike Weaver, Frank Bruno (twice), Gerrie Coetzee, Greg Page, Pinklon Thomas and Earnie Shavers. Unfortunately for Tillis, with the exception of a 1982 victory over Shavers, he lost to each of those men.

Part 2 is May 12, also in New York, with WBA champ William Joppy taking on Felix Trinidad. The winners of the two fights will square off Sept. 15 in New York.

"He knows this is his last hurrah," Hopkins said at Wednesday's final prefight press conference. "If I don't knock him out, I don't deserve to be the champion."

Hopkins is 38-2-1 with 28 KOs, while Holmes is 35-2 with 23 KOs. The latter, however, has not fought in almost a year due to contractual battles with promoter Don King.

"He'll never knock me out," Holmes said, responding to Hopkins' taunt. "I will not allow it. I didn't come this far to be knocked out.

"Talk is cheap. He's still got to fight me (and) I'm going to dictate the fight and make him commit to things that will get him in trouble. I won't fall into his traps."

Having beaten Marco Antonio Barrera twice -- including once by knockout -- Junior Jones had to feel good when Barrera upset Prince Naseem Hamed last Saturday in Las Vegas. Jones, 45-5, remains an active fighter and is scheduled to face Manuel Sepeda on April 19 in New Haven, Conn. He could find his way into a return bout with Barrera, or with one of the other champions at 126 or 130 pounds. "It means a lot to me," Jones said of the chance of landing a significant fight. ... WBC and IBF heavyweight champ Lennox Lewis and his April 21 opponent, Hasim Rahman, are in South Africa and preparing for their fight. "I look at Lewis as just a man," Rahman said at a Wednesday news conference in Johannesburg. "Regardless of what he's accomplished, he's still a man."