Byline: MICHAEL KATZ
NEW YORK -- I hope I'm wrong, but it seems fear and prejudice are hurting the gate for the Apollo's first boxing card Saturday night. People don't want to go to Harlem at night, even if the joint is jumping, as Fats used to sing.
The promoter, Cedric Kushner, said he did not want to ``extenuate what we believe is not the case'' -- that the lack of sales results from a belief the neighborhood is not safe.
But that's what it appears. One Briton, who arrived here for Prince Naseem Hamed's press conference Monday, was invited by Kushner to the Apollo.
``Me go to Harlem? Are you mad?'' was the reply.
A fight manager who almost had a kid on the undercard said, ``No way I'm going -- where am I going to park?''
There's a 480-car parking lot 100 yards from the famed theater.
``I don't run the 100 in 9.8,'' said another fight guy.
Kushner has a heavyweight card good enough to be seen on HBO -- another problem, of course, since New York will not be blacked out. Lou Savarese fights tough David Izon (nee Izonritei) in the main event and if the Bronx-born slugger wins, he could wind up challenging Lennox Lewis for the WBC title in February at the Garden.
Unbeaten Hamid Rahman, turned down by George Foreman as an opponent for Shannon Briggs, meets once-beaten Obed Sullivan in the other feature, and the winner surely will be rated in the heavyweight elite.
As of Tuesday, Kushner said he had sold 153 of his 1,450 tickets, not counting the 140 HBO bought. He was exaggerating, however. Another source said the actual ticket count was below 100. The day after the seventh game of the World Series, a full-page ad in the Daily News produced a grand total of four buys.
``I don't think it has to do with crime,'' said Jim Capel, senior assistant to Rep. Charles Rangel. ``All the events at the Apollo, I can't recall any situations (with visitors having trouble).''
Exactly. There's probably not a cop in the city who'd tell you that 125th St. is more dangerous than, say, 57th. In any case, the 28th Precinct will have two sergeants and 16 uniformed officers in the area Saturday night, and Detective Joe Pentangelo of the public information office refused to say if there also would be plainclothes officers around.
But that doesn't stop people from perceiving that Harlem is unkind to outsiders, and never mind all the tourist buses or the fact that it is now a major stop for foreign visitors.
Pentangelo, obviously a fight fan, pointed out that the Apollo was probably in a better neighborhood than Philadelphia's famed Blue Horizon.
There are other possible reasons for the slow sales. Ticket prices of $50 to $200 are designed not for local consumption but for the promoter to pay his $40,000 rent. Capel said, ``If these fights were in Long Island, I don't think I'd be going. If I lived in Long Island, I wouldn't be going. It's going to be on HBO.''
``I'm not sure it's the venue,'' said Mike Boorman of Main Events. ``The card took so long to take shape (Savarese was originally going to fight Briggs, who instead took a Nov. 22 date with Foreman, which freed Rahman to meet Sullivan) and so long to find a site, it just never took off.
``And that full-page ad clearly says you can sit home on the couch and watch.''
Lou DiBella, an HBO vice president who campaigned for the Apollo site, said, ``I'll bet by Saturday the place is sold out.''
``The celebrity interest is amazing,'' he said. ``Spike Lee is going to be here, Rosie Perez. Lloyd Price may be coming. Jessie Armstead is bringing a bunch of the Giants because he's apparently a buddy of Alonzo Highsmith (the ex-NFLer who is 23-0-1 in a sincere effort to be a pro boxer). Some of the Knicks are coming.''
Michael Katz writes for the New York Daily News.
