Minutes after defeating Dannie Williams on Sept. 12 at the Playboy Mansion, Eloy Perez found himself surrounded by beautiful women clothed in just spray-on bikinis.
As if coming out on top of a match between undefeated boxers for the vacant USNBC Featherweight belt hadn’t already put a smile on his face.
“All you see is Playboy girls naked, there ain’t no clothes or nothin’,” Perez, 22, said, smiling. “They’re everywhere. What’re you gonna do but stare, you know?”
He was the man of the hour — only because Hugh Hefner was absent — amongst hundreds in attendance.
“Who is Eloy Perez?” over the course of one night became “Look! There’s Eloy Perez.”
But the Playmates weren’t huddling around the newly-crowned titleholder because of his acquired fame or for his apparent swagger. After all, they call him “The Prince” because of his fondness for expensive clothing and accessories.
Instead, it was initiation and celebration time at The Mansion, and either he was going to jump in Hef’s famed pool fully-clothed, or the gang of girls would force him in.
He chose the latter, and — aside from his third iPhone — it was his only loss of the night.
“They just threw me in and it sucked,” Perez said. “Everything got wet.”
In winning the belt on a 98-91, 97-92, 95-94 unanimous decision, Perez garnered enough exposure to break into the top 15 worldwide, he said, and is in the works with cutting a deal to fight live on HBO Dec. 4.
With Rochester, Rainier, the Pacific Northwest, and the foundation of his life behind him, Perez is now under professional guidance en route to reaching every boxer’s dream: becoming a world champion.
But how did the 2006 Rainier graduate and former Lucky Eagle Casino fighter find himself in the limelight?
“Moving to California when I was 20,” Perez said, “I was scared.”
Garcia Management
Perez got the opportunity to go to California through Garcia Management, which, three years ago, hired him just to spar with one of its boxers while they were in the area.
Max Garcia is the team’s renowned trainer of the late Don Familton’s superior boxing methods, while Kathy Garcia manages the fighters.
“I saw him for the first time and said ‘I want to train this kid’,” Max said.
“We knew he needed a lot of work,” Kathy said. “He was very amateurish. He didn’t have the conditioning to be a top-notch boxer.”
This was apparent to Max Garcia during their first endurance workout, where Perez vomited while trying to hang with the group.
“Max is known for his conditioning,” Kathy said. “(Eloy) tried to run with our boys and he ended up throwing up.”
And after the Garcias got Perez in shape, they let him bump fists with their high-profile friends: WBA champions “Sugar” Shane Mosley and Chris “The Dragon” John.
Mosley, at 46-5-0 with 39 career knockouts, currently holds the title of WBA Welterweight Super Champion and has won world titles in three different weight divisions.
John, at 43-0-2 with 22 career knockouts, is the reigning WBA Featherweight Boxing Champion.
“It’s been a dream come true fighting with those guys,” Perez said.
“The reason I take him to “Sugar” Shane Mosley’s is that he’s an icon, a constant professional, and carries himself well — a great example for Eloy,” Max Garcia said. “He’s been exposed to these people and he wants to be equal or better.”
Sparring with the famous boxing figures didn’t bode so well for Perez to begin with, but as time wore on, so did his talent and confidence.
“Shane’s a lot heavier than I am but I get my tags in there, so it’s fine,” Perez said, laughing. “Now I beat up on Chris John. He’s at 126 and I’m at 130.”
It was all in preparation for when Perez would get his shot — something that didn’t take place until seven fights after his final fight in Washington.
“We had a boxer fighting at the Playboy Mansion anyways, and the opportunity came up immediately to fight Dannie Williams, who was undefeated,” Kathy Garcia said. “We didn’t even bat an eye. We knew it was for the title. What we were looking for was to test Eloy.”
So the Garcias made sure he was ready to bring the title home.
“He only sparred world champions to prepare for this fight,” Kathy said. “When you train with world champions, in your mind you, know you can be a world champion.”
The Fight
Upon learning he would get a shot at the belt, Perez began dreaming about it. He often envisioned how he would react when it was placed on him, and never thought about what would happen if he lost.
But before that came to fruition, he had to fight the heavy-handed Dannie Williams, known for his amateur career and being on pace with, if not ahead of, Perez in ambition.
He was back in unfamiliar territory. Perez admits he trembled as if it were his first fight ever, but found a sense of comfort in the nerves.
“I fight better when I’m scared, so it kind of worked to my advantage,” Perez said.
But once he hit the ring, the adrenaline set in and he was good to go.
The fight started off slow until the second round, when Perez caught Williams with a pair of hooks. “I dropped him with a left hook and came back with a right,” he said. “(Williams) got up wobbly and I wanted to finish him off.”
Big mistake.
As he exerted himself to try to end the fight early, Perez left himself open up the middle where Williams caught him with a right and dropped him to the canvas. Perez fell in the third round too, a victim of a counter overhand right while the two were trading punches.
In the fourth, Perez opened up a cut on Williams’ left eye, and targeted it for the remainder of the fight. Williams, who sports braided dreadlocks, took advantage of his loosening hair as, when the fighters were in close quarters, it would tend to whip into Perez’ face.
Once the sixth round bell rang, Perez went right after Williams’ cut, but he wasn’t budging.
And after four more rounds with no major action, the judges declared Perez — who had been knocked down twice — the winner by unanimous decision.
“(Getting a championship belt is) a feeling you can’t explain,” said Perez, who last achieved such status as the World’s Top Amateur Boxer when he was 17. “Coming from a small town and being in a world that’s really fast, that’s the most exciting part.”
No one was more surprised than Mosley, who called Garcia Management for the results, Kathy Garcia said. “Shane (Mosley) called when he found out Eloy won and said, ‘That Dannie Williams was a top notch amateur … He had over 100 amateur wins. I can’t believe he beat this kid.’
“I think I was supposed to lose in that one,” Perez said. “I want to prove everybody wrong, you know. That’s the whole point of me doing it: to become somebody.”
“Rochester’s a small town. It’s like nobody comes out of there,” he added. “It’s not that I want the attention. I just want to make it. I’m up for the challenge. I feel like I made it pretty far. I just gotta keep goin’.”
World-Class Fighter
Now living in Salinas, Perez — whose boxing record improved to 14-0-2 with three knockouts — still has high hopes of what his future holds.
“Hopefully by next year I’ll be fighting for the title,” he said. “That’s the plan: to get (the Featherweight title) before the next year.”
His management company sends him around the nation to watch other boxers, just so he can be a familiar face in the crowd and watch his future opponents, Perez said.
“Our priority right now is to get the best fight we can to put him in the position we need to be,” Kathy Garcia said. “There’s a lot of noise about him right now.”
If his Dec. 4 fight on national television goes through as planned, Perez will no longer have to deal with his hometown followers’ complaints of not being able to see him fight.
“Everybody wants to see me fight,” he said. “Now they can see me on HBO, just to show that I’ve been doin’ the damn thang.”
Kathy Garcia said the stipulation with the fight is that Perez signs with one of boxing’s top promoters, Golden Boy, beforehand and fights David Rodela, which he is interested in doing. Golden Boy also promotes Mosley, John, and Rodela.
But as his decision-maker, Garcia won’t commit just yet.
“It’s all about strategy,” she said. “Where is it going to be best for him and move his rank better? They want you to defend your title. They want to dangle that before they give you your ranking.”
Garcia, the manager, said Perez’ value has increased since fighting Dannie Williams. “(Williams) has brought in promoters,” she said. “More and more people are becoming interested. Maybe we don’t go with Golden Boy. There’s a lot of options out there.”
As for Max Garcia, he just can’t wait to get Perez back in the ring to show the world what he considers a once-diamond in the rough.
“We’re real pleased with his progress, demeanor, with his attitude for boxing,” he said. “If we keep going where we are going, there will be a world champion from Rochester, Washington.”
