Tony Baltazar vs Julio Alfonso ...1979

               

This was Tony’s second pro start; it was on a card headlined by our friend Herman Montes. We knew nothing about Tony’s opponent, Julio Alfonso, but we soon found out that he was a cutie pie. He out-boxed Tony in the first round to win the round. In between rounds I told Tony that he needed to cut the ring off this dancing fool. In the first minute of the second round Alfonso is on his toes throwing light-feather combinations at Tony, then he stopped; set himself and threw a right hand uppercut that land on Tony’s jaw, Tony wobble, blink his eyes and shook his head, he brought his hands up, walked up to Alfonso and unleashed a beautiful combination of a jab, short right hand and a double left hook. Fight over!!

Herman Montes won on points over Agustin Rivera in the main event…Good wins for the local boys

Tony Baltazar vs Juan Campos ... Olympic Auditorium ... 1980

This fight started fairly ever in the first round; early in the second round Campos hit Tony with a good right hand, knocking his mouthpiece out with it. The referee called time to replace Tony mouthpiece, after washing and replacing the mouthpiece the referee beckon both fighters back into action, at the referee gesture Campos rushed out of the neutral corner he had been send to and ran into Tony's left hook, fight over!

Floyd Mayeather vs Canelo Alvarez

                                                                                                                                           
                                                      By kiki

  

Watch the fights last night with family and friends. Liked that Cano kid that fought in the first fight, just one thing missing, he can’t punch. Carlos Molina? If God wants to punish me for any past sins, all he has to do is make me watch Molina fight.

The Danny Garcia vs Lucas Matthysse fight was in my opinion the best fight of the night. Gotta give Philly Ray a tip of the fedora for telling us naysayers how improved Garcia was since winning the title, yes, Danny has grown since winning the title, he is a much more disciplined fighter in the ring than he was before, He’d revert back to his wild swinging old style couple of times, but he caught himself doing it and corrected himself quick. He is going to be a force to be reckon-with at 140 pounds; or at 147, if he; decide to move up to that weight class. But I do think he needs to be kept away from Floyd for at least a year or more.

I have being telling my friends and anybody that would listen to me for some time now that Canelo was a manufactured fighter. What with his good looks, a Mexican with red hair, what was there not to like? But, I, from the first time I watched him fight saw a very limited fighter, my friend Charlie Ortega thought that Canelo was send down from the heavens, he betted the ranch last night and now he is homeless. I was constantly been told, “He is a young fighter, he is still learning” But now he has close to 50 fights, at what point do you say he has learned as much as he is going to learn? I say that time is now. Not to take anything away from Floyd, but, Canelo, in my opinion looked like a very ordinary fighter last night. Some will say “most fighters look ordinary against Floyd” and that may be true, Floyd is a master after all, but I can’t help feeling a bit vindicated in my assessment of Canelo.

Rodolfo Gonzalez vs Chago Carmona

                                             November 10, 1972

                                                         

                                                     By kiki

 I had gotten 6 comp tickets for the Gonzalez/Carmon fight from Don Chargin. I decided to take my wife, our one daughter and our three sons to see the fight. We were sitting about 11-12 rows from ringside. By us; there was a guy with thousands of dollars in his hands, and he was putting all his money on Carmona, very time he made a bet his money and the money from the guy he was betting was given to my wife to hold, at the end the guy backing Carmona had $100 left and he couldn't find any more takers, so I went for it and took his last $100, well you should have seen the rush of guys trying to get their money from my wife when Rodolfo won, she didn't know who had coming what or who was who, I got my two hundred dollars from her and told her to just give the money to who ever said they won and let's get the hell out of here, which we did, and the guy that lost? Well I thought he was going to cry, he probably did since he probably lost the rent money.

"California Split"

                                                  By kiki

In early 1974 I received a phone call from Howie Steindler telling me that he needed me, Frankie and Tony the following week at the Olympic Auditorium for a movie shoot, I always wanted to be a movie star, so I said, “we’ll be there, Howie”

I don’t remember what day of the week it was, but the following week we showed up at the Olympic. Howie introduced me to the movie director whom name I don’t recall. The name of the movie is “California Split” starring George Segal, Elliott Gould and Ann Prentiss

When we got to the Olympic I saw that Joe Medrano, a Jackie McCoy fighter and bantamweight champion to be Albert Davila, were also there. The movie script called for Davila to kayo Medrano in the second round of a fight, I was to play Medrano’s chief corner man. With Medrano on the floor I was to jump into the ring and take his mouth-piece out. Frankie and Tony were to spar before Albert and Joe’s fight, which they did.

We stood around for hours while the director and his people fiddle around. We were finally called into the ring. Davila and Medrano were introduced, just like in a real fight, by Jimmy Lennon. Don’t remember who played the referee, but he gave instructions to Albert and Joe. In the first round Albert and Joe went toe to toe. After the first round I started to give Joe instructions, just like in a real fight, and as I am doing so, Joe said “Frank I don’t want to get kayo” I told him he had to get kayo, that it was in the script, that it was just a movie, he then said to me “but Frank, I’ve never taken a dive in my life” I had to bite my tongue to keep from laughing. Joe went along with the script and took a "dive", as he was lying on the floor I jumped in the ring, and as I went for his mouth-piece he started laughing so hard he was rolling on the ring floor. I thought he had ruined the scene, but the director said that was fine, that he had gotten what he wanted.

We were paid in cash. I was given $1000.00.  Off that Frankie and Tony got $300.00 each and I kept $400.00…It was not the first time the manager kept more than the fighter.

Most of our scene wound-up on the cutting floor, I appeared for about three seconds in the movie.

Meeting With Don King

 

Frankie & Tony Baltazar  

                                              
                                                    
                                                 By kiki

One cold February day in 1982 I received a phone call from Don King's New York office. The voice on the other end of the line was that of one of King's office secretary's. The voice told me that Don King would like for Frankie, Tony, and I, to fly to New York for a meet. She said that King was interested in signing the boys to, as the voice put it "a Don King contract". I told the voice that I would be interested in hearing his offered.

Arrangements were made for us to fly out of LAX. Don't remember what time we flew out, but we arrived in New York City's John F. Kennedy International Airport in the wee hours of the morning in the middle of one of the worst snowstorms the city had seen in decades. The storm was so severe that all transportation to Manhattan was suspended. As we were sitting in the airport terminal waiting for the taxis/buses to resume running an old black guy that looked to be close to ninety years old walked in, said he had a bus and that for 5 dollars a head he would bus us into Manhattan, said he would drop all of us at the same place, none of this “take me here, take me there stuff“ He mumble as he sipped on some coffee, or at least what we though was coffee. We took him up on it. The bus looked somewhat like the ones you see in Tijuana, minus the goats and chickens on the roof. We got into Manhattan while it was still dark. The city was at a standstill because of the storm. I'm not sure where the old man dropped us off, but it wasn't close to where we needed to go. We had rooms waiting for us at a hotel on 8th Avenue off of 42th Street. We were some blocks or maybe a few miles from there, not sure which one it was.

Let me say that we were not the only ones that King invited to meet with him. There were others from LA that made the trip. Three flew with us on the same plane, I can't remember who they were, one might had been boxing manager/trainer Jerry Moore. Anyway, we, with the others from LA, found ourselves standing in a Manhattan street, or was it an avenue? Who knows, all I know was that we were freezing our priceless appendages. As we were standing there freezing we notice a taxicab coming our way. We all run out on the street to flag him down, he stopped and told us that he was off duty, was on his way home. We told him that if he gave a ride to 8th Avenue and 42th Street we would make it worth his while, he said okay, but that it was going to cost us, we asked how much, he said seven dollars, we looked at him and than at each other, than he said "for all of you" Damn! I think we were all willing to give him twenty bucks each just to get out of the cold!

Don King held a big press conference in a big fancy hotel to introduce a number of fighters to the press. Present at the press conference were some entertainment figures, like actress/singer Eartha Kitt, actor/dancer Gregory Hines, singer James Brown and political activist Al Sharpton. It was to say the least an impressive event. In another story I wrote how Jimmy Montoya won eight hundred dollars with my money, he needed it to buy a new suit to wear to the press conference.

                                         THE DEAL

After the press conference some of us were driven to King's office which was located just off Park Avenue. When I was called into a small but elaborate office, King and his sidekick, Duke Durden, were seated there. King in a big chair behind a very expensive looking desk, Duke was sitting off to the side of King. After quick preambles all around; we got to talking turkey. First deal I was offered was this: three fights guaranteed per year, for three years. Sounds good, but here's the kicker: All nine fights had the among of money set up front, no matter who the boys were going to fight, title fights or not. Also they would get to name the opponents. That meant that I couldn’t negotiate anything, money or opponents. With that kind of a deal the boys wouldn’t had needed a manager. I told Duke Duden, who was doing all the talking while Don just chewed on a cigar, that that deal; was not right for us. That bought Don into the talks. He offered me a second deal. He said that I could bring his son Carl in as a co-manager. I could see that in taking that deal I would had been out as co-manager in less than six months. I stood up and shook their hands, told them “thanks but no thanks” I thanked Don for his hospitality and walked out.

That night, our last night in the Big Apple Tony and Frankie partied till the wee hours with Tex Cobb….The boys later told me that Cobb’s was charging food and drinks to Don King…We came home and never again heard from King.

              

                   Tony Baltazar, Eartha Kitt and Frankie Baltazar