The Paris News from Paris, Texas • Page 5

10 July S. 19M 'Brawler' hoping to gain boxing championship By KEN PETERS AP Sports Writer VAN NUYS, Calif. Alex Garcia was known on the street as "Jaws," the biggest, fiercest fighter of all the youths in all the gangs around the Mexican- American barrio in San Fernando. His brawling behavior led him into prison. Now he hopes it will take him to the heavyweight boxing championship.

He's had 19 amateur fights in 20 months and won 17, 13 by knockouts. He ended his first eight fights in the first round. One of his two defeats was to Teofilo Stevenson, Cuba's great super heavyweight. "I always wanted to box, but I just never took the time to go into the gym and train; I was having too much fun on the streets," Garcia said. He claimed he never lost in hundreds of street fights.

The fun ended when Garcia was convicted of involuntary manslaughter after a gang fight slaying and spent five years in California prisons at Soledad, San Quentin and Chino. By the time he was released, he had decided to do his fighting in the ring. Tutored by former middleweight Blinky Rodriguez, Garcia rapidly began dispatching amateur foes. He won the Southern California Golden Gloves title and went on to win a gold medal at the national championships. He lost a close decision to Wesley Watson, but avenged that defeat when he stopped Watson in two rounds to earn a spot on the U.S.

team for the recent World Championships in Reno, Nev. There, Garcia knocked out his first three foes, but was stopped in the second round of the title fight by Stevenson, the dominant fighter in international amateur competition for years. "I want to fight him again," Garcia said. "I want to redeem myself." Garcia, 220 pounds, said he wants to redeem himself in another way, too, as a role model for youths in the San Fernando Valley, a suburban area northwest of Los Angeles. "He's doing all the right things JAWS Alex Garcia, known on the street as "Jaws," works out at a gym in Van Nuys, Calif, recently.

Garcia was stopped by Teofilo Stevenson in the World Championships in Reno, Nev. in the second round of their bout for the championship. "I want to fight him again," Garcia said. (AP Laserphoto) now," Rodriguez said. "For two years, since he got out of prison, he's been working hard six days a week showing desire and discipline." "One thing you do in prison is think, and particularly toward the end of my time, I thought a lot about what I wanted to do when I got out," Garcia said.

"Right after prison I came over here (to Benny's Jet Center martial arts and boxing complex in Van Nuys). I told myself I was going to become a fighter, going to stick with it. "It was a big adjustment getting out (of prison). You get institutionalized, get out of the habits of normal life. Although I wanted to be a boxer, I never thought I'd come this far this fast." Natural ability and good training quickened the process.

"There are some things you can't coach," Rodriguez said. "He's got natural athletic ability. He's got durability, heart, power and he's come along real fast. "When we went to the world championships, a lot of guys came up to me and asked me how many fights he'd really had. They couldn't believe he'd only fought 18 times and he was fighting for the gold medal in the world championships with that few fights." Garcia also had the good fortune to spar from the start with Mike Weaver, a former World Boxing Association heavyweight champion.

Garcia said he was a little wary when he first got into the ring against Weaver. "I knew he had much more experience. One time he hit me, I'd never been hit that hard in the body before," he said. Garcia next plans to fight in a United States-Soviet Union mat- chup on July 26 in Sacramento, Calif. Reds' fans ready to retire Rose to record books HEARING BOOS Cincinnati Reds player-manager Pete Rose is hearing more boos than cheers these days as his club is floundering near the bottom of the NL West after being picked to win the division.

(AP Laserphoto) By JOE KAY AP Sports Writer CINCINNATI Pete Rose is the first to admit it his first season as baseball's reigning hit king has been more of a royal problem than a crowning jewel to his 24-year career. Less than a year after the Cincinnati Reds' faithful made Riverfront Stadium ring with chants of his name whenever he appered, many are ready to retire Rose to the record books. Lusty boos washed over Rose as he struggled to push his average much above .200 and his ballclub took a tumble to last place in the National League West. "So far, this has been a tough year," said Rose, the Reds' 45-year-old player-manager. "Not because of anything except the fact we're not winning like we're capable." Last Sept.

11, Rose climaxed his chase of Ty Cobb's all-time hit record with a single off San Diego's Eric Show, giving him a career total of 4,192. They painted a circle on the outfield turf where the single landed, renamed the street in front of the ballpark "Pete Rose Way," and snapped up T-shirts and other momentos of the historic event. Less than a year later, many of the fans who canonized Rose are criticizing him for playing. When a Cincinnati newspaper conducted a call-in survey last May, 169 of 293 fans said Rose should give up the player half of his title to get others in the lineup. After missing the end of spring training and the early part of the season because of the flu, Rose was hitting just .122 at the time while the Reds were collapsing.

Columnists began calling for his retire- ment. Each ground out brought waves of boos. "I'm in the situation where I could go 10-for-10 and make an out the llth time, and people would say I should retire," Rose said. "I could hit the ball right on the nose four times at the second baseman and I'll have a guy in the stands yell that I can't hit the ball out of the infield. Everything is compounded because we're not winning." No one knows better than Rose that fan reaction is as predictable as a 3-2 fastball.

If you hit and your team wins, you get cheered. Don't hit while your team wins, you'll get booed. Fail to do both, and you should buy earplugs. Baseball legends aren't immune. "The reaction doesn't surprise me because if you get a couple of hits and start winning, they'll be back on your side," Rose said.

"That's baseball." Bill Bergesch, the Reds' general manager, understands. "When you're losing, the fans get edgy," Bergesch said. Rose, a lifetime .304 hitter, batted a career-low .245 with Philadelhia in 1983, but was rejuvenated when he returned to the Reds as player-manager in August, 1984. Rose hit .365 in a Reds' uniform the rest of the season, following with a .264 average last season as he chased Cobb. He suspects that part of the backlash is because some fans and writers expect Rose at 45 to play like Rose at 25, lashing singles to all fields and flinging himself headlong into the next base.

"Some people expect me to get 200 hits and score 100 runs," Rose said. "But I'm not the same Pete Rose who was leading off, either." He admits the boos and criticism sting. "Sure, it would bother anybody," he said before a game last "It would affect anybody. When I go out there tonight, I want to get a nit every time up." The matter of his retirement apparently is for future consideration. Rose says he'll know when the time comes to quit, and Bergesch isn't about to push him toward the bench.

"Pete gives our club a pretty good shot in the arm when he's playing," Bergesch said. "I don't see another player on our roster who plays first base better than Pete. He's still capable of getting a hit for us that's meaningful. "We're talking about one of the all-time great players in baseball. We're not talking about a Joe Blow who is a run-of-the-mill player.

"The time is not here now when I'm going to go to Pete Rose and say, 'Take yourself Pete has all of my confidence." Fans' confidence in Rose received a shot in the arm in June. Rose started hitting better, batting .345 over his last eight ganjes of the month with a .441 on-base percentage. As Rose suspected, the hits started transforming the boos into familiar chants of "Pete, Pete, Pete." Rose is trying not to take the retirement talk too seriously. "There were guys who said I was finished when I left here (as a free agent) in "78," Rose said. "What can I do about it?" Resurgent Giants making waves in the NL West By STEVE WILSTEIN AP Sports Writer SAN FRANCISCO It's a little early to compare the resurgent San Francisco Giants to the Miracle Mets of 1969, but look at the standings.

It's the first of July, nearly mid- season, and the Giants have been at or near the top of the National League West every step of the way. When was the last time an NL team lost 100 games or finished in the cellar one year and won a pennant the next? Hint: It wasn't the New York Mets, who finished next-to-last in 1968. Answer: It never happened. (For trivia buffs, in 1890 Louisville won the pennant in the American Association, then the second major league, after finishing last, 66Mz games out, with a 27-111 record the year before.) It may not happen this summer, but don't tell that to the Gee Whiz Kids on the Giants. They believe in miracles, and so do their fans, who are setting a record for sending telegrams and letters.

"I've watched the Giants for 25 and I remember the glory days," said Tim Walton, 34, of Fremont. "This is a glory team, this is a team that has restored the love of baseball in the Bay area. To be able to say they may go all the way, that is amazing. Now the fans are coming out of the closet. My wife is obsessed, driving down the highway, listening to the games and screaming 'Go There's still a lot of baseball left, plenty of time for the bubble to burst, but the Giants are undaunted.

"We're going to win this thing," pitcher Mike Krukow said. "If people think we're just a fluke and take us lightly, that's good. I hope they take us lightly the whole year." This time last summer, the Giants were in last place, 18 games behind division-leading San Diego, and grumbling on the way to their worst season ever while playing to empty seats. "We were a bad movie last year," Krukow said. "I wouldn't have paid to see us play.

Nobody wants to watch crummy baseball and that's what we showed them. This year, the fans are not only coming out to the ballpark, they're psyched up in the communities, too. Giants fever is contagious." Fifth-year catcher Bob Brenly noted with a grin that, "In the past, it wasn't always the proper thing to walk into a restaurant and say you play with the Giants and hope to get a good table. They'd stick you in the kitchen. This year we get better seats." The players got charged up when bundle after bundle of telegrams from fans were delivered to the team during a recent trip to Houston.

At Candlestick Park, no one talks about the wind and cold anymore and the average attendance has leaped to 20,000 from 13,000 at this point last year. Veterans like Krukow, Brenly, pitcher Vida Blue, and hard-hitting outfielders Jeff Leonard and Chili Davis are as hungry as the fans after years of suffering. But rookies don't know the hard times, and this team is full of players who dropped through the fog from Phoenix and began playing, as Brenly said, "like they were bom to the job." At times there have been as many as six rookies in the lineup. Thev heard new Manager Roger Craig tell them in spring training that they could win the division this year and they believed him, no matter how hard skeptics laughed. "A lot of people talked about how young we were and said we were going to be in the cellar," rookie second baseman Rob Thompson said.

"They were saying our double-play combination wasn't any good and we had a long way to go. But we fooled them all." Indeed, the Giants have so far fooled everybody, without mirrors or tricks. They are near the top of the league in runs, batting average, pitching and turning double plays with an infield of two rookies and two second-year players. "We have a lot of no-names who are just doing everything that has to be done on a daily basis in order to win ballgames," said Al Rosen, the Giants president and general manager who has made some key trades to open opportunities for the rookies since taking over last fall. Thompson got a chance to play regularly when Manny Trillo was traded to Chicago and has been so good in the field that Rosen flatly calls him the league's top rookie so far this season.

At first base, rookie Will Clark jumped to a strong start and, after getting hurt June 3, was relieved with aplomb by rookie Mike Aldrete. Big, rangy Chris Brown at third and sure-handed Jose Uribe at shortstop also do a lot for a pitcher's confidence, diving in the hole to take away singles. "There's no doubt in my mind that Chris Brown is the best third baseman in the National League," said Rosen, four times an All-Star at third. "I think he's going to go on to have a tremendous career and be a very potent force, the type of player who will change ballgames." Brown, a powerful 6-foot-2, 210 pounder, is challenging for the batting title with an average of about .340, but Rosen is more impressed with the 24-year-old's fielding. Perhaps in equal measure because of the infield and the split- finger fastball taught by new Manager Roger Craig, the mostly veteran pitching staff is among the league leaders in earned run average.

CLASSIFIED 785-5538 230 Special Notices BOOKS-BETTY Is back. Jeff's Bookstore is now under new management, 205 Main, Paris. MACK'S CAFE Now Open For Business 443 1st SW (Market Square) CALL CLASSIFIED ANYTIME Invlta you to UM our office houri recorder to make In your claulfled advertising or place a new ad. 785-5538 If you didn't receive your daily newspaper call this number 785-8744 24 hour phone service for classified advertising customers. You'll Find Rare Finds at Great Prices In The Classifieds Whether you need a pet, a boat, a rocker or hay for your cattle you'll find it in The Paris News Classifieds.

785-5538 235 Money To Lend Fact confidential loam for working women rcllreei. We In loam to Individual! with no prevloui credit. Security Finance 104 N. Main 784-6616 270 Lost And Found FOUND. BLONDE Cocker Spaniel mother dog.

has had puppies recently. 200 block NW 271h. 784-4858. FOUND! FAMILY scrape book belonging to Joe Swain or family dating from 1930's to 1940's with Navy write ups, pictures letters form World War II. For more information call 73-2 4579.

FOUND LEMON 8. white male Pointer dog, ap proximatcly 2 years old. Area North of Lake Crook. Lamar County Humane Association. 784 6774.

FOUND. MALE Cocker Spaniel at The Continental Village Apts. Older dog. Call 784 1518 or 784 5855 to identify, FOUND. WHITE female Spitz at the BUS on Loop 286.

Call Lamar County Humane Asr.ocintion, 784 3369. LOST. GREY 8, red boat seat. If found please call Bob's Marine, 7R4 0853. LOST SET of keys on ring at Pat Maysc Dam.

Call 732 3106. PEOPLE NEED CLASSIFIED Paris News Classified 785-5538 280 Personals FREE PREGNANCY test. Confidential counselinq. For appointment 784 5465. IF YOU or someone you love has a problem with drugs or alcohol call collect 24 hours a day for free information 314 628 6581, NOT RESPONSIBLE for debts made by other than myself in person, Monty Claypool, 125 w.

Paris. June 30, 1986. OPENING MONDAY, July 7th. Under new management, The Tropic Restaurant, 120 Bonham. Good home cooking friendly atmosphere.

Come in 8, meet Bobbie, Terry Becky. We're looking for ward to serving you. Open Monday Friday, 63, Saturday, 7 3.