Columnist Dean Juipe: Tinley takes the wheel at America Presents

Dean Juipe

Thursday, Aug. 30, 2001 | 10:01 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.

Mat Tinley is a rich man, so picture him for analogy's sake riding in the back seat of a limousine and being chauffeured by Dan Goossen.

After a few bumps and bruises, Tinley decides he can handle the wheel better than the fellow he initially hired for the job, and he relieves Goossen of his duties.

This passenger-becomes-the-driver imagery is, in essence, what has happened at the promotional firm America Presents in the past week. Tinley, whose deep pockets financed the boxing promotional firm through its first five years of existence, has decided to run the business himself.

Goossen is out and says he will start his own company, Ten Goose Sports.

And Tinley has taken the controls at America Presents.

"It's my money, it's my company and I have a very strong view on how it should be run," Tinley, 40, said from his office in Denver. "It was absolutely the right decision for me, and I think Dan would say it was the right decision for him."

Largely unexpected when the move was announced late last Thursday, the shift in power at America Presents puts Tinley in the driver's seat. He says he has the time to become a full-time boxing promoter, and, at least as importantly, the desire.

"I feel 20 years younger already," he said. "How lucky am I? I feel alive ... like a kid. I'm on 80-hour work weeks now, but this isn't work. You know what? I'm enjoying it. I'm dealing with top-class athletes and putting shows on TV.

"I've been trained to run entertainment and promotional and management companies all my life. This is a natural for me."

He said the reaction within his company has been excellent and that Goossen's duties will be absorbed not only by himself but by a team that includes publicist Fred Sternberg, matchmaker Tom Brown and attorney Jeff Fried.

"It isn't necessary (to replace Goossen per se)," Tinley said. "Everyone here has the ability to step up and accept more responsibility. This is an A-plus team with no slouches, and I'm letting them off the leash.

"It's all positive energy around here now, and I haven't seen that since Day 1."

Tinley was tired of his role as background financier.

"I'm going to run the company differently," he said. "We're going to make money and do it the right way. We're going to be successful and we're going to become the best boxing company that ever existed."

The inference is that America Presents had some shortcomings that Tinley can correct, and that the company had lost a good deal of money in recent years. As for precisely how much money it had lost, Tinley would only reply "more than a lot."

America Presents has a contract for a weekly series on Fox Sports Net (which is a deal that Tinley negotiated even before he hired Goossen), and it also has a number of high-profile fighters including current world champions Joel Casamayor and Steve Forbes. But the firm has had its share of minor calamities in recent months (as detailed in this space last week), particularly the sagging careers of David Reid and David Tua.

"It wasn't the last straw," Tinley said of Tua's Aug. 18 loss to Chris Byrd at the Cox Pavilion in Las Vegas. "Don't blame Tua for all of this. He's got enough on his shoulders as it is."

Tinley was noncommittal as to whether he will keep America Presents' office in Las Vegas open, although it appears as if he will not. Aside from his office in Denver, he also has one in Beaumont, Texas, that could be utilized for boxing business if need be.

An America Presents gym in Denver was recently closed due to lack of traffic and its equipment was donated to a local Boys Club.

"We were a gas guzzler," Tinley said of his company's business practices during Goossen's reign as president and CEO.

Tinley isn't intimidated by adding to his workload, to say nothing of his prestige.

"I'm a pretty good critical thinker," he said. "I'm a pretty creative person and I work well with other people. I think we can improve our TV shows tremendously and I think we can take a fresher attitude toward our athletes.

"If there was a time when I was scared to death, it was in our first year when our shows were inconsistent and marginal and I wasn't happy with them.

"But those have improved and I think they can improve again. Everything I have to do -- dealing with talent, contracts and TV -- are strong suits for me."

The MGM Grand, which has hosted De La Hoya's previous two fights in 2001, has expressed no interest in the fight with Karmazin, an unknown commodity who is 27-0.

Look for the bout to go to the East Coast in an effort to broaden De La Hoya's appeal and, perhaps, capitalize on the many Russian natives living in the New York City area.

Best guesses: current vice-chairman Luther Mack of Reno ascends to chairman; and a Southern Nevada resident, perhaps Dr. Tony Alamo, will be named to join Mack, Dr. Flip Homansky, Glenn Carano and Amy Ayoub on the panel.

"He believes he can do the same thing again," Lewis said in New York, referring to Rahman's fifth-round TKO April 22 in South Africa that gave the challenger the WBC and IBF heavyweight titles. "(But) I'm telling you he can't."

Saying the loss was a "wake-up call," Lewis claims it "ignited a flame in me to come back to the game and do it right." He added that he would retire if he did not win the rematch.

Bettors in Las Vegas are confident Lewis will deliver, as he is currently a minus 400 favorite in the Mandalay Bay sports book. Rahman is a plus 320. There is also a proposition bet, at a minus 130 that the fight will not go seven full rounds and even that it will.