Tony Perez (referee)

Anthony Perez (1931 – December 14, 2021) was an American boxing referee and judge of Puerto Rican descent. During his career, he refereed many major boxing fights and participated in a number of boxing related documentaries.

Perez was active as a boxing referee during five decades; he oversaw fights between 1968 and 2005 and was both acclaimed and criticized among boxing's connoisseurs; he refereed 431 professional boxing fights, including many world title ones. Several of the matches he refereed involved world boxing champions and Hall of Fame members.

Early life and career

Perez was born in Brooklyn, New York, but lived in Puerto Rico as a youth before returning to New York. He lived in Barnegat Township, New Jersey. He was licensed to referee fights both in New York and in New Jersey, but he refereed fights around the world.

Perez started boxing as an amateur while in the United States Army, according to People Magazine. He was the Army's Caribbean area's Welterweight champion and then went to serve in Germany, where he obtained the Army's European command championship as well.

One night at a fight his mother attended, he got a cut on one of his eyes, leading her to ask him to give up boxing. Perez got married and had a son, he then worked odd jobs until finding work at a Seagram's distillery as a salesman. It was then that he decided to return to boxing in the refereeing and judging capacities, but it took him several years to be assigned his first fight.

Major fights refereed

The first bout that Perez was assigned was the one between Buster Mathis and James J. Woody, which Mathis won by sixth-round technical knockout September 26, 1968, at the Madison Square Garden in New York. On May 26, 1969, Perez was the referee for the Dick Tiger versus Nino Benvenuti ten round non-title affair at the Madison Square Garden. Tiger won the fight by ten round unanimous decision; Perez was both the referee and one of the three judges for this fight and he scored it for Tiger 7-2-1; both Tiger and Benvenuti are now members of the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

First world title bout

The first world championship bout refereed by Perez was the Joe Frazier versus Jimmy Ellis main attraction on Monday, February 16, 1970. Ellis was the defending World Boxing Association's world heavyweight champion with a record of 27 wins and 5 losses, 12 wins by knockout against Frazier, who was undefeated and untied in 24 bouts, with 20 knockout wins, and recognized (Frazier) as the world heavyweight champion in the American states of Illinois, New York, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and Maine. This bout also took place at the Madison Square Garden. Frazier won the bout by fifth-round technical knockout after Ellis could not come out of his corner after the fourth round.
Two weeks later, Perez was back in the ring to referee the bout between future world middleweight champion Rodrigo Valdez of Colombia and ranked Puerto Rican Pete Toro, which Valdez lost by ten-round decision.

On October 26, 1970, Perez was the referee in the bout between the comebacking Muhammad Ali, who was making his first fight after a three-year exile forced by boxing authorities over his refusal to join the United States Army in 1967, and California's Jerry Quarry, the first of two fights between those two boxers. The bout was held at the City Auditorium in Atlanta, Georgia, and Ali won by third-round technical knockout.

Over the next three years, Perez oversaw 18 more fights, all in New York and most at the Madison Square Garden or the theater on the Garden's property, the Madison Square Garden's Felt Forum. Many of these bouts included world champions and top rated boxers such as Angel Espada, Harold Weston, Enrique Pinder, Davey Vasquez, the Bobby Cassidy-Tom Bethea match, the Jerry Quarry versus Randy Neumann fight, Jorge Ahumada against Ray Anderson and Vito Antuofermo facing Danny McAloon. None of these were generally considered to be very important fights, however.

Ali-Frazier II

Then, on January 28, 1974, Perez came to the international spotlight when he was chosen to referee the Muhammad Ali-Joe Frazier rematch, pitting the two former world Heavyweight champions as they tried to return to the world title, in a match contested for the North American Boxing Federation's Heavyweight title. Frazier had 30 wins and one second-round knockout loss to George Foreman (when he lost the world Heavyweight title) while Ali was 43–2, with 31 knockout wins, having lost to Frazier in their first bout on March 8, 1971, and to Ken Norton; he had avenged the loss to Norton and was now trying to avenge his loss to Frazier; at stake was a fight against Foreman for the world title. His handling of the bout was marred by an incident in the second round where Ali had hurt Frazier with 20 seconds to go in the second round and Perez stepped between them as he thought he had heard the bell sound. Ali went on to win by twelve round unanimous decision, but Frazier and his trainer Eddie Futch were critical of Perez’s unwillingness to penalize Ali for repeatedly holding Frazier during the encounter.

Shavers-Stallins

On November 4, 1974, Perez was the referee for a bout that is widely considered by fans and experts as one of the biggest upsets of boxing of that era as Bob Stallins, a 21 win, 24 loss, with only 4 knockout wins, trialhorse, beat 46 win, 3 loss, and 45 knockouts Earnie Shavers, by a ten rounds decision, dropping top contender Shavers, renowned as one of the hardest punching boxers in the sport's history and also considered to have one of the strongest chins ever, in round nine. Perez, who was also one of the three official judges for the bout, scored it 6–4 in rounds for Stallins. This bout was held at the Felt Forum. Eighteen days later, Perez was back as both referee and judge for the main event between Hall of Fame member Emile Griffith and Vito Antuofermo at the Madison Square Garden, which Antuofermo won by ten rounds unanimous decision. Perez voted 6-3-1 for the winner.

Ali-Wepner

Perez's next assignment also became a very prominent fight in boxing history when, on March 24, 1975, Ali defended the world Heavyweight title versus Chuck Wepner. Perez was called in to referee this bout; his second fight refereed outside New York (the first had been Ali-Quarry I). Underdog Wepner became an instant celebrity when, in round nine, he scored a knockdown of Ali. This also became a controversial matter-many have felt that Wepner only dropped Ali because Wepner stepped on Ali's foot as he landed a punch to Ali's heart. Wepner disputes this. Nevertheless, the knockdown and fight allegedly inspired Sylvester Stallone to write and film the first Rocky film. Perez's refereeing that night was, ironically, unsatisfying to the winner Ali, who, according to Perez, complained that Perez let Wepner hit Ali with low blows and called him a "dirty dog". Ali commented that Perez was "not Black and (he's) not White-(he's) Puerto Rican but (he's) trying to be White", "He is more Black than White, but he's trying to be White".

Perez hit Ali and ABC Wide World of Sports (which televised the bout in the United States) with a suit asking for 20 million dollars, a federal court resolved the suit in favor of Ali.

Perez was the referee for Carlos Monzon's only fight as a professional in the United States, when he stopped Tony Licata in ten rounds to retain the world Middleweight title at the Madison Square Garden, on June 30, 1975. He next took his first trip abroad as a referee, going to Oslo, Norway to officiate the match between Monzon's personal friend, Argentina's Victor Galindez and Norway's Harald Skog for the former's WBA world Light-Heavyweight crown, a bout won by the Argentine by a third-round knockout on March 28, 1976.

After referring several other major fights, including one of Yoko Gushiken in Japan and bouts including Alexis Arguello, Wilfred Benítez (versus Bruce Curry), Alfonso Zamora, Wilfredo Gómez