The first question is, or ought to be: If Jose Antonio Rivera retired from boxing, would anybody notice? The last time we saw Rivera, the former WBA welterweight and junior middleweight champion was being soundly beaten by Travis Simms last January on the Samuel Peter-James Toney card at the Seminole Hard Rock in Florida. In his hometown newspaper yesterday, Rivera (38-5-1) resurfaced to blast Don King, demanding that his longtime promoter either release him, or else he would “contemplate retirement.”
Rivera claimed that he had planned to meet with King at Foxwoods last Saturday night, but that the meeting failed to take place because the World’s Greatest Promoter blew him off.
“You can say that Jose Rivera is contemplating retirement,” Rivera told the Worcester Telegram’s Bud Barth. “I’m not going to fight under Don King’s banner.”
In a story given further legs when it was distributed by Rivera trainer John Scully, El Gallo further charged that King had reneged on the terms of the three-year contract he signed with DKP almost two years ago, which was supposed to guarantee him three fights a year at a minimum of $150,000 a fight.
Rivera, who has fought just once in each of the last five years, told Barth that he had earned the specified minimum just once.
“I’m comfortable enough making this decision,” Rivera said of his “retirement” threat. “It would be very disappointing, and I’m not going to do anything to maliciously try to sabotage their promotions, but I want to educate fighters that — you know what? — this is how they operate. There’s going to be a stern warning to fighters, letting them know how they’re going to be treated.”
Barth went on to supply his own editorial comment, which was that “King has a long history of using fighters and then throwing them away like yesterday’s garbage. But the treatment of Rivera on Saturday at Foxwoods hardly befits a championship-caliber fighter.”
Rivera acknowledged that King left complimentary tickets for Saturday night’s Juan Diaz-Acelino Freitas fight for him and his sister/attorney, Maria Rivera-Ortiz, but complained that since he didn’t have ringside credentials he was unable to get the attention of the promoter or DKP vice president Bobby Goodman.
“I’m not going to stand up and yell their names,” Rivera said.
“What we did to deserve this blindside I’ll never know,” said Bobby Goodman after reading the dispatch in the Worcester paper. “Don’t forget, not only did we get Jose two world titles, and two fights in Worcester, but he pulled out of four fights: One with a broken hand (Tomas Daamgard), once when he came down with a severe cold on the day of the weigh-in for Roy Jones-John Ruiz card in Vegas, the Mayorga fight at Madison Square Garden, where he would have been paid title fight money -- $250,000, plus his training expenses which he’d already received, and another when he came down with bone chips in his elbow.
“But even with all these pullouts in important fights, we still managed to get him two world championships, and to promote two world title fights in his hometown,” added Goodman, who described Rivera’s complaint as “all bullshit.”
DKP, noted Goodman, paid Rivera $100,000 for not fighting Mayorga, and subsequently arranged a 2005 welterweight title defense in his hometown – “which he lost, to Luis Collazo.”
Goodman added that no meeting at Foxwoods had ever been scheduled, and that he and King hadn’t even known Rivera was coming until the day of the fight.
“If I’d known, we would have set something up – and he certainly would have had a credential,” said Goodman.
As for blowing Rivera off, Goodman said that the promoter had a post-right meeting scheduled with Diaz’ representatives and left Connecticut early the following morning.
Rivera also complained to Barth that King had been holding up his appearance on a contemplated Worcester-area show promoted by Jimbo Isperduli, but Goodman said that was not the case, either, claiming that neither Isperduli nor Rivera had forwarded details of the proposal as requested.
“It’s not fair to Don and not fair to all of us that have helped this kid,” said Goodman. “We've never done anything but help him.Ü He's doing the same thing to us that he did to Tank (former manager Steve Tankanow), who helped him from the start. He even used poor Bud Barth – and that’s just wrong.”
Goodman said he had contacted Barth, who apologized for not checking with DKP to get its side of the story before rushing into print with Rivera’s blast. He expects Barth to set the record straight, but as for Rivera, he said – and you can interpret this any way you wish -- “the damage is done.”
M
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