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This Day In Sports…March 1, 1997:
If not the biggest, it’s the most visible fight in the career of one of Idaho’s most popular boxers ever, Kenny Keene. The Emmett Eliminator fought on the undercard of a Sugar Ray Leonard-Hector “Macho” Camacho bout in Atlantic City. Before Camacho retained his IBC middleweight belt with a fifth-round TKO of Leonard, Keene lost his IBC Cruiserweight title to Robert Daniels in a 12-round slugfest, with the split decision booed lustily by the crowd of 10,000.
Keene was 28 and was at the peak of his career. He had held the IBC Cruiserweight crown for almost two years and had defended the title seven times leading up to the Daniels fight. The most memorable bout during that stretch was against Bobby Crabtree, who had been the last one to beat Keene in Crabtree’s hometown of Fort Smith, AR, in 1995. Keene felt he had been defeated by home cookin’ the first time. He found himself back in Fort Smith for this title defense, but Keene left no doubt, taking Crabtree out via a ninth-round TKO.
Despite the loss to Daniels, Keene would nail another crown in 1998 when he won the IBA Cruiserweight championship over Rocky Gannon by TKO at Boise’s Bank Of America Centre (now Idaho Central Arena). Keene’s career would last nine more years—he would go 51-4 overall with 28 knockouts.
Keene’s first professional bout was held in 1990 at the Boise Hawks’ Memorial Stadium, a four-round decision over Ray Pacheco of Albuquerque. His final fight was part of what was supposed to be Boise’s biggest boxing card ever in July, 2006. The opponent was “King” Arthur Williams in a the leadup event to a bout between Roy Jones Jr. and Prince Badi Ajamu. Keene suffered a 10th-round TKO, walking away with a couple of broken ribs, and that was it. It also effectively marked the end of the Boise boxing scene.
(Tom Scott hosts the Scott Slant segment during the football season on KTVB’s Sunday Sports Extra. He also anchors four sports segments each weekday on 95.3 FM KTIK and one on News/Talk KBOI. His Scott Slant column runs every Wednesday.)
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