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In the interest of speed and timeliness, this story is fed directly from the Associated Press newswire and may contain spelling or grammatical errors.
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Hometown favorite wins in return to the rural
Saturday August 16, 2003
By TOM GARDNER
Associated Press Writer
GARDNERVILLE, Nev. (AP) Cheered on by a partisan crowd, Jesse
Brinkley hung on to keep his unbeaten record intact with a close
but unanimous decision as cow pasture boxing returned to its home.
Brinkley (22-1-15) held off a dogged defense by Danny Perez
(28-4-17) of El Cajon, Calif., Friday night.
``He's hard to hit. He covered that body well with his elbow. He
was really good,'' Brinkley said.
He said he was spurred on by the cheers of fans from his home
town of Yerington, Nev., some 50 miles down the road.
He was slowed in the fifth round by what looked like a low blow
as he dropped to one knee. Afterward, he said the shot hit the
upper part of his pelvis, but he took the rest to regroup.
Perez said that cost him the fight.
``When I hit him, it was a clean body shot. If it had gone to a
10 count, he would have been counted out,'' he said. All three
judges gave Perez the round.
At the final bell, judges Burt Clements and Chuck Giampa scored
the 10-round fight 96-94 in favor of Brinkley. Keith Macdonald saw
it 97-94. The Associated Press favored Brinkley 95-94.
Brinkley, who has been fighting as a middleweight, lost six
pounds to weigh in as a junior middleweight at 154 pounds, one more
than Perez. It was his first bout scheduled for more than six
rounds.
``It was a beautiful graduation,'' he said.
The fight marked the return of boxing in a ring set up in a
rural venue some 60 miles south of Reno.
The late Gardnerville casino owner Milos ``Sharkey'' Begovich
began staging the bouts in 1973 and sponsored them until 1991, when
ESPN quit covering the matches.
His daughter Mashelle promoted them this year in an alfalfa
field south of the cow pasture, which now is a small housing
development. ESPN2 returned to televise the bouts before a crowd of
1,952.
In the first televised fight, junior middleweight Anthony
Thompson (12-0-9) of North Philadelphia, Pa., stopped Dewey
Welliver (14-5-1) of Spokane, Wash., in the fifth round.
Steve Luevano (20-0-9) of La Puente, Calif., outpointed Miguel
Escamilla (18-5-1-14) 54-50 on all three judges' cards in a super
featherweight bout.
(Copyright 2003 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
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