December 14, 2005

By Karl Freitag

Golden Boy Promotions matchmaker Eric Gomez has responded to comments made by California State Athletic Commission Executive Officer Armando Garcia regarding the commission's cancellation of a nationally televised fight featuring jr middleweight contender Marco Antonio Rubio vs. Aslanbek Kodzoev.

"Oscar and all of us at Golden Boy were very upset at the way this was handled by the Commission. It was conflicting stories between Chief Inspector Dean Lohuis and Armando Garcia. It makes you wonder do we even want to continue to do shows here in California?

"We love California. It's our backyard. We respect the commission, but these guys can't get their act together. This was really, really bad. It hurts us, the promoter. It hurts our relationship with HBO. It hurts the fighter mainly, because now he doesn't have money."

Gomez said that a week earlier, Rubio had passed a physical in Texas (where the fight was originally scheduled) but they wouldn't accept it in California because it wasn't California paperwork. As a result, Rubio took another physical shortly after a workout and prior to the weigh-in. He failed that physical due to low blood pressure and slight dehydration.

"When he first failed the physical, if they would have told us 'Sorry the fight's off. There's nothing we can do about it,' we would have been fine with it. These things happen," said Gomez.

"However, Armando said 'The only way he's going to fight is if he takes a series of tests the next day and passes them. We did exactly that. We spent something like $1,000 on all these tests. Every single test he passed. At one o'clock they told us we had a fight. Rubio gets there at four o'clock. He does the official weigh-in and takes the contract. When we get to the arena, all of a sudden they cancelled the fight on us because they said there was one exam missing.

"That exam was never mentioned to us. We would have gotten that exam done, but Dr. Daniel Cepin told us 'I spoke to Armando and he never told us to do a electrolyte test....that is a very simple test. I could have gotten that test done, but he never said to do that test.'

"The next time we do a show here (in California), if we decide to do a show here, hopefully they can get their act together and we can get it done."

Gomez also told Fightnews.com that the fight between Rubio and Kodzoev has been rescheduled -- this time in another state. Marco Antonio Rubio will fight Aslanbek Kodzoev on January 27 in Chicago in a fight televised by Telefutura.