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IBF title on line in May

Friday, March 07, 2003

By Chuck Finder, Post-Gazette Sports Writer

The title unification bout between lightweight champions Paul Spadafora of McKees Rocks and Romanian Leonard Dorin is scheduled for May 10 or 17 at a Pittsburgh venue to be determined later.

And the HBO-televised bout wouldn't be in Pittsburgh if not for Dorin's back.

During his fights, Dorin, the World Boxing Association's lightweight titleholder, wears a temporary tattoo touting a sponsoring dot.com casino, Golden Palace. His handlers, InterBox of Montreal, don't want to forgo such a payday by staging the match in one of the casinos that promoter Mike Acri fancied, Mountaineer Race Track & Gaming Resort in Chester, W.Va., or the Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, Conn.

"It looked like the fight was going to Mountaineer or Mohegan," Acri said yesterday. "Then that issue came up.

"I would've preferred Mountaineer because of the [low] rent and without the Pittsburgh taxes. The Mohegan is the same thing. But I really can't blame Dorin's people."

Instead Acri hopes the match for Dorin's WBA title and Spadafora's International Boxing Federation belt will be at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center or the Petersen Events Center.

Spadafora has fought twice at the Convention Center and also has defended his title at the Palumbo Center, IC Light Ampitheater and Mellon Arena. His promoter aimed to stage the Nov. 9 fight against Denis Holbaek at the Petersen Center, but university officials didn't have the time or inclination to upstage their basketball season openers by preparing their building for a bout.

This time, Pitt administrators approved a bid for the Spadafora-Dorin card, and SMG officials -- who manage the facility -- were crunching numbers and preparing the documentation yesterday.

"Hopefully, in the next four, five days, we'll know where" the card will be waged, Acri said.

The fight received sanctioning from the WBA last month after a mild controversy. Don King demanded that his top-rated WBA challenger, Miguel Callist of Panama, should be first in line to face Dorin, who agreed to a fight last fall before being injured and canceling the bout. When talk of the Spadafora-Dorin union arose, Dorin's governing body refused to sanction it. King and Callist were given a $50,000 fee to step aside late last month and clear the way for a IBF-WBA unification match.