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    « BACK to Erik Boland's portfolio

    Posted 03.30.03
    Santos Ready but Fight Put on Hold


    By Erik Boland

    January 12, 2003 — Uncasville, Conn. - Aneudi Santos walked out of Mohegan Sun Arena on Friday night $2,000 richer but left feeling empty.

    The 20-year-old Hofstra junior, 6-0 with four knockouts in a professional light heavyweight boxing career dating to Oct. 10, 2001, was scheduled to fight Darren Whitley (13-19) of Easthampton, Mass. It was part of a seven-bout card, some of which was to be televised as part of ESPN2's "Friday Night Fights" package.

    Instead, with his hands wrapped in chalky athletic tape and red gloves stuffed over top, Santos learned he would not be boxing. A representative of DiBella Entertainment, which promoted the card, gave Santos the news in the locker room.

    "I'm a little upset," Santos said as he watched Mohegan Sun workers disassemble the ring.

    ESPN2 allows a 2 1/2-half hour block for its weekly boxing program. This Friday, it aired from 10:30 p.m. (EST) until 1 a.m. The network typically shows two fights live, then airs "swing bouts," which are taped earlier in the evening and are used as "fill time" if the main bouts fail to take up the 2 1/2 hours.

    Lou DiBella, the card promoter and head of DiBella Entertainment, said he had "rearranged" the order of Friday night's bouts, anticipating that the live fights would run short and ESPN2 would fill in with Santos' fight live.
    "We made an educated guess that no way those [live] bouts would go the distance," DiBella said.

    Both did. A flyweight bout went a full 12 rounds and when the main event, which matched heavyweights DaVarryl Williamson against Robert Wiggins, ended shortly before 1 a.m. after going 10 rounds, the evening was declared over. DiBella said Mohegan Sun personnel told him that they were not going to start another fight.

    "I don't blame them," DiBella said. "It was 1 in the morning."

    Santos said he knew there was a chance his fight would not be shown on ESPN2, but sitting out never entered his mind. Explanations of botched match-time calculations, or even getting his share of the purse for an evening spent in the locker room, did little to placate Santos.

    "It's not about the money or any of that," Santos said. "It's about bringing the people here from Long Island to see me. I wanted to make my people happy."

    Not to mention himself. Santos said training for a boxing match is a "24-hour a day thing, mentally and physically." Not fighting, to Santos, was as draining as taking a punch to the stomach.

    Santos' last fight, Oct. 25, 2002, ended when Santos knocked out Hilario Guzman in the fourth round. DiBella said Santos would be added to one of his fight cards "in the tri-state area" within the next 2-3 weeks but did not specify where.

    "We'll get him on a card somewhere," DiBella said. "The kid's ready to fight."

    No one knows that more than Santos.

    Copyright © 2003, Newsday, Inc.