Lack of press at small shows

In a piece I wrote about Erik Morales that is about to go up, I reflected on something a little off base.

Saturday night, Morales fought Maidana in a fight that was called a total mismatch but still saw a large turnout of writers for it, which is a very good thing.

The night before in Primm was a Telefutura SoloBoxeo card headlined by Jessie Vargas against Vivian Harris. Primm is 40 minutes away from Vegas.

15% of press row was made up by members of my family as me and my brother Mario Ortega Jr of 15rounds were covering the fight. If you don't count print journos whose focus isn't boxing, we were probably fifty percent.

Also note that we drove into Primm on Thursday and made it to the weigh-in. We live in Northern California and it was a 10 hour drive there and back. Most of the press that came into Vegas [and were probably there Thursday and Friday] were no shows.

Its things like this that make me realize why boxing is a niche sport and not mainstream. Sure the Primm card didn't have a super exciting main event but it had a pretty good storyline. Vivian Harris was once a promising fighter that won a title at a young age and was now a fight or two away from being out of relevancy for good. Jessie Vargas was a kid who struggled mightily with the perennial Golden Boy trial horse Cristian Favela in his last fight. It also featured an undefeated Olympian from Africa Bastie Samir in his toughest fight to date.

Why is it so common for these cards to go overlooked? I've covered maybe seven Telefuturas this year and another alarming thing is lack of attention given by Golden Boy. They basically outsource their shows and co-promote in name only, usually sending only one representative to the shows that have been showcased in my area, San Francisco and Fairfield.

We need more help on the ground level to build the sport.