Welcome to Nevada

Dean Juipe

Thursday, June 13, 2002 | 8:46 a.m.

Most fighters get into the game out of desperation, or, in more ideal settings, to pursue fame and a world championship. Few, if any, do it on a whim.

Nevada Stupak falls somewhere in between.

The son of legendary Las Vegas casino owner and entrepreneur Bob Stupak, Nevada Stupak made his professional boxing debut last Friday at Caesars Palace. A cruiserweight, Stupak forced fellow novice Tommy Hickey to quit after two rounds of their scheduled four-round fight.

The bout delighted the crowd and brought a sense of satisfaction to the winner, who is a gifted athlete yet one who had never stepped between the ropes with every eye on him.

"You can't believe the pressure," he said of being the focal point of the crowd. "But now I have the experience of actually having been in a fight. I'll never have to say 'Boxing is something I should have done, but didn't.' I won't have to live in regret."

The scenario that led Stupak to accept the fight with Hickey, which was part of a Cedric Kushner-promoted card, was accelerated and caught everyone in his family by surprise.

His father, for instance, didn't know the fight was a go until the day before it happened.

"I only gave him one day to worry," Nevada Stupak said. "Most in my family and circle of friends didn't think it was real until the day of the fight, which was good because it kept them from being overly concerned.

"I'd been in the gym and training and suddenly the opportunity to fight presented itself and I took it. It was quick, but I said 'I'm into it this far, so I might as well go ahead and do it.' My inspiration was at its peak and I'm one of those people who feel if you don't do something when you're inspired, then you just won't ever do it."

Matched against Hickey, who was 0-1, Stupak dropped his opponent in the second round and had another near knockdown moments later. On advice of the ringside physician, Hickey retired on his stool before round three.

"I fought a good fight against a tough, scrappy boy from Arkansas," Stupak said. "But what people don't realize is that even when you win a fight, you get hurt.

"You never step out of a fight without getting at least somewhat beat up."

While Stupak, 26, doesn't harbor dreams of becoming a fabled world champion, taking a fling at boxing wasn't done on a lark. He spent six weeks in the gym in preparation for his debut, with veteran trainer and manager Wes Wolfe orchestrating the camp.

"His dad told me he was interested and asked if I would help out," Wolfe said, adding that he has been a long-standing friend of Bob Stupak. "Nevada and I had talked occasionally about boxing and he wondered how long it would take him to get ready to fight, and I said it was up to him.

"But this kid has a great work ethic and every day it was 'I want to learn.' He was eager and ready."

While he was already immersed in training, it was seeing the May 18 Kostya Tszyu vs. Ben Tackie fight at Mandalay Bay that whipped Stupak into a frenzy. Tszyu successfully defended his undisputed junior welterweight titles and Stupak was hooked on the notion of becoming an active participant in the sport.

"He called me after almost every round and I could hear the inspiration in his voice," Wolfe recalled. "He was marveling at how Tszyu controlled the fight."

Yet Stupak has always followed boxing and fancies himself as more than a casual bettor when it comes to the premier bouts.

"I've been a big fan my entire life and thanks to my dad I've seen a number of great fights," Stupak said. "When you see a tremendous fight, it energizes you.

"But as a person with opinions on boxing, I noticed that my views didn't always correspond to the views of some former fighters I know, and I always wondered why. I had to get that experience of actually being in a fight.

"The more I got into boxing, the more I made myself a participant. I felt I needed to put the experience of actually fighting on my resume if I was going to have a valid opinion about boxing."

Now he has a firsthand knowledge of the perils, and the joys, of the ring.

"The people who say 'Oh, it's not that hard' or say that so and so is a wimp or question why someone doesn't seem to try harder in the ring don't have a sense of the reality of the situation," he said. "There's no question you can and will get hurt, and if you can't take a beating you don't have any business being in there."

He has learned that body shots do more damage than it sometimes appears, and, thanks to heavyweight sparring partner Mark Connolly, he knows what it feels like to be dazed.

"I absorbed two bell-ringing shots but I didn't drop," Stupak said of the session. "Man, he can hit hard. But surviving that showed me I could take the punishment, and surviving punishment is sometimes what makes the difference between champions and losers."

Wolfe said Stupak has what it takes to at least make a dent in the sport.

"He's heavy handed, and you can't teach that," Wolfe said. "We can match him carefully and bring him on slow, but what I liked about him from his first fight is that he utilized his jab, he put some combinations together, he held his ground and he has what I call the Holyfield Syndrome, which means he might get hit but he will definitely hit back.

"To be frank, I'm surprised at how good he's looked. If he hadn't ... if he had two left feet ... I would have told him so and gotten him out of it."

A former dealer at the Bellagio and most recently a table game supervisor at the Fiesta Rancho, Stupak has taken a leave from the gaming profession to pursue not only boxing but a political career. While he once ran against Gary Reese for a spot on the Las Vegas City Council and lost, he is now running against Myrna Williams for the District 6 seat on the Clark County Commission.

His campaign office sits in the shadow of the Stratosphere, which was built on the site where his father owned and operated the former Vegas World casino.

An active participant in sports throughout his life, Stupak has played football and volleyball and still goes hard in basketball, yet boxing offered him a novel experience.

"I'd never been involved in a one-on-one sport like this," he said. "I had to see what it was like and I'm glad I did, but I wouldn't recommend it if it's not in you. It's not one of those things where you say, 'Let me check this out.' It's the sweet sciences, and I'm not a master of any of them."

A free agent of sorts without a contractual tie to a specific promoter, Stupak is keeping his boxing goals reasonable. Asked, for instance, if he could picture himself working his way up to becoming a 190-pound champion, he came back with a lighthearted reply.

"I could become the Las Vegas cruiserweight champion, or maybe a celebrity champion like they have on TV," he said with a laugh. "That's about as realistic as my championship goals are apt to get."