Marc Ratner's election to Boxing Hall of Fame a win for ethics, integrity

Riddick Bowe defeated Evander Holyfield to win the undisputed heavyweight championship at the Thomas & Mack Center on Nov. 13, 1992, in Las Vegas in what remains one of the great heavyweight title fights ever held.

They rematched in Las Vegas nearly a year later outdoors at Caesars Palace, when Marc Ratner was just wrapping up his first full year as executive director of the Nevada Athletic Commisison.

Bowe won the first three rounds of the fight, and seemed as if he'd successfullly hold onto the belt. But Holyfield roared back and won the next three to even the scorecards. As they were fighting at a high pace in the seventh, the action was interrupted when a man flew a hang-glider into the ringside area.

James Miller, who would become known as "The Fan Man," crashed into ringside in Bowe's corner. It was a crazy situation, but Ratner did yeoman's work keeping what was under his control in order.

Ratner recalled the incident on Wednesday, a short time after learning he was one of seven persons chosen for induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame. Ed Brophy, the Hall's executive director, announced that boxers Hector Camacho, Hilario Zapata and Lupe Pintor, Ratner, broadcaster Bob Sheridan, judge and broadcaster Harold Lederman and columnist Jerry Izenberg were chosen.

The seven will be formally inducted on June 12 in Canastota, N.Y.

Ratner's election strikes a blow for honesty and ethics. Ratner was with the commission from 1983 through 2006, when he left to take an executive position with the UFC. He began as an inspector in 1983, became chief inspector in 1987 and was named interim executive director in 1992 when his friend, Chuck Minker, became ill with cancer. Ratner was given the job on a full-time basis in 1993 after Minker's death.

"It's certainly very overwhelming and I'm just so humbled," Ratner told Yahoo Sports. "I was humbled to just be nominated, but to be elected, I can barely express it. I remember sitting in the top row of the [Las Vegas] Convention Center watching Joe Brown and Carlos Ortiz, and later Muhammad Ali. I never in my wildest dreams figured I'd be in the middle of the Mike Tyson years, and then all the Oscar [De La Hoya] fights."

Ratner, who was also a college football referee, played a big role in helping keep things together and orderly when Miller crashed into ringside, near where Louis Farrakhan, the leader of the Nation of Islam, and then-Washington, D.C., Mayor Marion Barry were seated.

If that had occurred a decade later, after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in New York on Sept. 11, 2001, it could have been much worse, Ratner said.

"I think the most important thing was that [ring announcer] Michael Buffer did a really good job keeping the crowd calm while we figured out what was going on," Ratner said. "From my standpoint, having been a referee in other sports, football and basketball, I knew there were things I had to do to maintain the integrity of the match. I went to the timekeeper and found out exactly where we were in the round, so I knew if we resumed, exactly how much time was left in the round.

"I went to the judges and told them to be sure they knew how they were going to score the seventh, because it if were going to be stopped, they'd have to score that round and it could decide the outcome."

Ratner was known for his honesty and integrity, and fighters, managers and promoters trusted his judgment and his fairness. Though not everyone agreed with every decision he made, they trusted that Ratner was making the best call he could.

It was a coup for the UFC to hire him away from the commission in 2006. UFC president Dana White hired Ratner to help him use his influence with regulators around the country to help get mixed martial arts legalized in every state. New York is the only state where it remains illegal, and that's more of a political issue than anything else.

"In the fight business, everyone hates everybody and everyone is battling with everyone else, but everyone loves Marc Ratner," White told Yahoo Sports. "He's one of the most respected men in the history of the sport. Because of that, he was able to get a lot of things done that others weren't able to do."

Ratner's other most memorable moment in boxing came when he was in charge of the second Mike Tyson-Evander Holyfield fight in 1997, in which Tyson bit Holyfield on the ear twice.

After the first bite, referee Mills Lane said, "That's it," and said he was disqualifying Tyson. Ratner jumped onto the ring apron while Holyfield was being attended to and spoke with Lane.

He asked, "Are you sure?" and Lane reconsidered and let the fight go on. He then disqualified Tyson after the second bite.

"Again drawing on my officiating background from football, whenever an official would want to throw someone out, they'd go to the referee, the guy in the white hat, and the referee would say, 'Are you sure?' " Ratner said. "I just wanted to understand what Mills wanted to do and to let him think about it. There's chaos and I just wanted to give him that courtesy to have a second to think about what he wanted to do. It was his call, but when I asked him, it allowed him to think about how he wanted to proceed."

Other inductees:

Hector Camacho: A world champion at 130, 135 and 140 pounds, the colorful Camacho was never knocked out in a career in which he went 79-6-3 with 38 knockouts. He fought many of his era's greats, including Julio Cesar Chavez, Roberto Duran, Sugar Ray Leonard and Oscar De La Hoya. He died tragically when shot in 2012 at just 50.

Lupe Pintor: Pintor held the bantamweight and super bantamweight titles and compiled a record of 56-14-2 with 42 knockouts. He successfully defended his bantamweight belt eight times after winning it in 1979 from the great Carlos Zarate.

Hilario Zapata: A light flyweight and flyweight champion, he compiled a record of 18-4-1 in world title fights and had a record of 12-6-1 against world champions.

Bob Sheridan: A colorful character, Sheridan has called fights on radio and television for more than 50 years. He once called a heavyweight title fight a day after having heart surgery, and was escorted back to the hospital after the bout. He has been the blow-by-blow announcer for nearly 1,000 title fights.

Harold Lederman: Lederman was elected as a judge, though he is best known as the unofficial judge on HBO's boxing telecasts, a job he's held since 1986. He was one of the best judges in the world starting in 1967 and judged many of the most significant bouts of his time.

Jerry Izenberg: One of the best sports writers of all time, and not just in boxing, Izenberg covered the sweet science for more than a half century, much of that as the lead columnist for The Star-Ledger. He also won the Nat Fleischer Award for career excellence in boxing journalism in 1978.