Friday, Aug. 1, 1997 | 10:17 a.m.
For a man who spontaneously refereed his first fight wearing bowling shoes, Davey Pearl achieved a certain unparalleled success.
Thursday it was announced that the 80-year-old Las Vegan will be inducted into the World Boxing Hall of Fame in Los Angeles. The ceremony is scheduled for Oct. 25.
Pearl, who still serves as a boxing judge, refereed about 3,000 fights during a 35-year career.
But his first one caught him by surprise.
"It was at the Silver Slipper," he said. "Jim Deskin (of the Nevada State Athletic Commission) needed a referee and asked me if I wanted to do it. I'd been a timekeeper and a (boxing) judge, but never a referee. He asked if I had the right shoes and I lied and said I did, and I went out to the car and got my bowling shoes.
"I didn't know anything about refereeing and got hit right on the chin in that very first fight. But I had so much adrenalin flowing, I didn't even feel it."
Despite his slight frame -- 5-foot-4 and 135 pounds -- Pearl moved up the boxing ladder and came to be recognized as the finest referee of his era.
His first world title fight remains one of his three favorites. It was March 17, 1969, at the Las Vegas Convention Center and it featured junior middleweights Freddie Little and Stanley "Kitten" Hayward. Little won the 15-round bout by decision.
Other pearls: Leon Spinks over Muhammad Ali, Feb. 15, 1978; and Sugar Ray Leonard over Thomas Hearns, Sept. 16, 1981.
"The Ali-Spinks fight moved me up from being the sixth-rated referee in the world to No. 1," Pearl said. "After that, I was traveling all over the world. I was almost traveling too much, working four nights a week. I'd come back from one fight and there'd be a telegram waiting for me to referee another.
"Atlantic City, Miami ... I was going all over. I loved refereeing and never could get enough."
Among his many anecdotes is an Earnie Shavers vs. Larry Holmes heavyweight title fight in 1979 that ended with Pearl stopping the bout and shouting at the ringside physician. Holmes had been down in the 10th round but was hurting Shavers in the 11th when Pearl summoned the doctor to look at Shavers' badly damaged eye.
"I smelled a problem because the doctor had never worked a fight," Pearl said. "I brought Shavers over and said 'Check his eye' and the doctor looked at it and said 'He's blind, but it's OK.' But I stopped the fight and, boy, did I ever tell that doctor off. The whole crowd at ringside heard me."
He needed a police escort not only out of the ring that afternoon, but out of the building.
"They were throwing things at me and calling me names," Pearl said. "It was the only bad experience I had in 35 years of refereeing."
In addition to his career in boxing, Pearl once owned two cocktail lounges in Las Vegas. "I needed that regular check every week to keep me going," he said.
He also spent 13 years as director of promotions for UNLV. "I raised some big bucks and never had a loser," he recalls. "I started raising money for the university from the telephone in my bar and I was doing so well they hired me full time."
While he continues to judge fights for the NSAC, Pearl said he misses refereeing. "But I'm glad to still be around the game," he added.
He's also happy to be headed for the World Boxing Hall of Fame and be part of its 1997 class that also includes former lightweight champion Juan Zurita, former bantamweight champion Albert Davila, former middleweight champion Al Hostak, former featherweight champion Johnny Famechon and former heavyweight contenders George Chuvalo and Cleveland Williams.
"It's always nice to be remembered," Pearl said. "It was mentioned to me a year ago that this might happen, but I can't say I knew it would for sure."
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