Thursday, Nov. 13, 2003 | 10:33 a.m.
One boxer has a plate in his head that he failed to disclose until confronted on the issue, while another underwent an MRI that indicated an abnormality was present.
Yet Marco Antonio Barrera will fight Saturday in San Antonio and Jorge Paez is scheduled to fight Dec. 5 in Phoenix, in both cases somewhat to the dismay of the Nevada State Athletic Commission's Medical Advisory Board.
Barrera, regarded as the finest featherweight in the world, takes on Manny Pacquiao in a fight from the Alamodome to be televised by HBO. Barrera has been medically cleared by doctors in Texas, yet it was just in the past few days that he has admitted undergoing a heretofore secret operation to remove malformed blood vessels from his brain -- a procedure that also resulted in the insertion of a protective plate to guard the area.
Paez, a former lightweight world champion, was of particular interest to the NSAC on Wednesday when his promotional firm, Top Rank, requested that the NSAC drop the "red flag" it has placed beside his name in a national registry of fighters.
Top Rank vice president Todd DuBoef made a presentation on Paez's behalf before the Medical Advisory Board and was exasperated when it asked only for additional testing and deferred to the NSAC on the question of Paez being "red flagged." The NSAC may address the subject at a meeting later this year.
"It's none of Nevada's business," DuBoef said later in the hallway outside the commission offices. "Paez isn't licensed in Nevada and doesn't want to be licensed in Nevada, yet Nevada is campaigning to keep him from fighting."
He then said "someone" from within the NSAC offices had been calling states where Paez has been fighting and advocating that those states prevent him from fighting.
"I know that's happening," DuBoef said. "We heard it in Illinois (where Paez recently fought) and we heard it in Arizona (where he'll fight an opponent yet to be determined next month at the Dodge Theatre in Phoenix). We were told by the boxing people in those states, 'You know Nevada called,' as if Nevada was going out of its way to say Paez shouldn't be licensed."
Paez, 38, is 78-14-5 in a lengthy pro career. A former circus performer as a child and teen, Paez was a popular, if outrageous, fighter in a heyday that came to an end several years ago.
DuBoef admits that Top Rank "undermatches" Paez for his fights, indicating the firm is protecting the fighter while using him to headline or fill out cards on the Spanish-speaking Telefutura network. Paez remains a solid ratings draw for that TV network.
"I'd feel very bad about it," DuBoef said, when asked what his reaction would be if Paez were to suffer a head injury in a bout. "But we're very protective of that."
Paez came under Nevada's purview, the Medical Advisory Board believes, because he took an MRI in Beverly Hills, Calif., last spring in preparation for a March fight in Las Vegas that he later said he wouldn't accept. That MRI was forwarded to the NSAC and was "consistent with mild chronic trauma," said the Medical Advisory Board chairwoman, Dr. Margaret Goodman.
But DuBoef and Top Rank allege that the abnormality that was present in the Beverly Hills MRI was consistent with a man "who drank too much" and that ensuing medical tests taken in Illinois, Texas and Arizona (where Paez has fought in recent years) have cleared the fighter to participate in the rigorous sport.
Goodman disputes DuBoef's allegations that the ensuing tests "clear" Paez and she points out that he failed to provide the Medical Advisory Board with one of the three test results that supposedly cleared the fighter. She also theorized that Top Rank could produce Paez, have him take the necessary tests either in Las Vegas or under the guidance of the NSAC, and have his situation resolved once and for all.
"We don't know the significance (of the Beverly Hills MRI) and we'd like for him to undergo additional testing," Goodman said. "Paez did part (of the required medical exams to be licensed in Nevada) and there was a part that was not completed.
"We weren't allowed to finish the process."
After discussing Paez's medical status during a conference call, the Medical Advisory Board -- which includes Goodman, Dr. Jeff Parker, Dr. Al Capanna, Dr. Todd Chapman and Dr. Anthony Pollard -- accepted a motion by Chapman in which the board "informs the NSAC that Jorge Paez needs a follow-up examination."
That motion passed, thereby keeping Paez on "red flag" status until the issue of jurisdiction in the matter can be assessed by the NSAC.
Paez, who has not been licensed in Nevada for four years, remains neither suspended nor prevented from fighting. His medical status is a matter for the boxing regulatory board in each state where he wants to fight.
"This is the most preposterous situation," DuBoef said. "Nevada is trying to police the sport of boxing and is acting like it is the Federal Boxing Commission.
"I think the state is going beyond its bounds."
Asked if he would return and address the NSAC when the joint subject of Paez and Nevada's jurisdiction appears on the commission's agenda, initially DuBoef said he would not.
"I walked into a windstorm in there," he said. "I had to listen to doctors who never saw this man fight. It's ludicrous (and) I'm not going to do the same spiel for the commission."
Later, however, he indicated that he "might" appear at a future NSAC meeting on the subject. DuBoef and Top Rank brought the issue of Paez's condition to light when DuBoef wrote an Oct. 23 letter to the NSAC in which he requested the state drop its "red flagging" of Paez; NSAC interim chairman John Bailey responded by asking the Medical Advisory Board for its opinion on Paez's test results, which were known for some time in private circles to have contained an alleged abnormality.
"That's not why I'm here," DuBoef pleaded. "This is a jurisdictional issue. If it's going to be like this from now on, Nevada has opened a real Pandora's Box. Is Nevada going to rule on the medical status of thousands of fighters in the country?"
No, said deputy attorney general Keith Kizer.
"It's not like we're going around looking at every fighter's medical records," he said. "But in this particular case, the fighter had begun the process of medical testing to be licensed in Nevada."
If the NSAC would like more information on Paez, which it isn't apt to get given that there are no plans to have him fight here, the same holds true with Barrera -- who is something of a fixture on the local fight scene even if his fight Saturday is in Texas.
While it remained undisclosed until last week, Barrera underwent surgery Aug. 29, 1997 in Mexico in which corrective action was taken to alleviate the headaches Barrera was experiencing from having a small group of blood vessels clustered in his head. For whatever reason, he kept that surgery a secret until admitting to it -- under pressure -- just in the past week.
Barrera has fought 16 times since the surgery, including nine times in Nevada. He neither volunteered information on the surgery nor had it detected during prefight medical exams.
Barrera, 29, is 57-3 and has not lost since undergoing the surgery despite having strenuous fights with Erik Morales, Johnny Tapia, Naseem Hamed and others.
"If it was a problem, I would have retired a long time ago," Barrera told the Associated Press in San Antonio.
Drs. Andres H. Keichian and Jorge Guerrero of Texas have cleared Barrera for the fight with Pacquiao.
"He's fit to compete," Keichian said.
"He's completely cleared," Guerrero added.
But, privately, some members of the NSAC and its Medical Advisory Board question Barrera's situation and are offended that they weren't informed of his condition.
"I wouldn't say 'bothered' is the right word and I understand why he was reticence to tell us," said one person affiliated with the NSAC, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "But I've got to believe the reason he kept it a secret is because he knew we'd probably be concerned and that we might not let him fight."
Barrera, who now has a small plate in his head attached by screws, would have to apply for a license in Nevada before being required to undergo more stringent medical testing in this state.
As Paez and his handlers have since discovered, that is not a process a fighter wants to begin unless there is a certainty that the fighter wants to fight here.
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