File This One in the Glove Compartment

LAS VEGAS — Are both sides correct in predicting a tough, brutal fight tonight when Erik Morales and Marco Antonio Barrera put on the gloves to battle for two super-bantamweight titles?

If it’s as good as Friday’s fight over which gloves to put on, it will be a classic.

Before a 24-hour argument over the brand of gloves to be used was ended by a coin flip, Barrera’s side had threatened to walk out while Morales’ side fumed.

This was no act staged to hype the appeal of tonight’s main event. Those familiar with the fighters, the best Mexico has to offer, already were rubbing their hands in anticipation of the matchup at the Mandalay Bay Events Center.

Between them, the fighters are 84-2. Morales (35-0, 28 knockouts) is putting his World Boxing Council championship on the line tonight, and Barrera (49-2, 36 knockouts) is risking his World Boxing Organization title.

Everything seemed to be moving smoothly toward the showdown until Thursday, when each side told Marc Ratner, executive director of the Nevada State Athletic Commission, that it wanted a particular brand of glove.

Unlike many commissions, Nevada’s requires both fighters to wear the same brand.

“We have had the same unwritten policy for the last 20 years,” Ratner said. “We feel both fighters should carry the same equipment into the ring.”

Ratner gave the sides until Friday’s weigh-in to reach agreement. With the scales in readiness, there was none.

Morales wouldn’t budge. Barrera proposed the use of a neutral brand.

Finally, Ratner fixed up a coin with a B on one side and an M on the other and announced that the winner of the flip would choose the gloves.

“We will not fight,” said Ricardo Maldonado, Barrera’s manager, before storming out of the room.

With only Morales’ handlers present, Ratner tossed the coin anyway and it came down with the B side showing.

Told that he had won the flip he’d wanted no part of, Maldonado decided that maybe it was a good tiebreaking device after all.

Barrera got his choice of gloves and the weigh-in went on, about an hour later than scheduled. Barrera, from Mexico City, weighed in at 121 1/2 pounds, half a pound under the limit; Morales, from Tijuana, at an even 121.

Yet even afterward, neither side seemed satisfied.

“Whatever they want to do is fine,” Barrera said through a translator. “If they also want to flip to see who wins the fight, let’s do that too.”

Fernando Beltran, Morales’ manager, also was upset.

“They would not have fought if they had lost [the coin flip],” he said. “But it is still going to be the same thing, a knockout for us.”

Morales appeared to be in a funk after losing the coin flip.

“Do you want to fight or not?” Beltran asked him.

It was a rhetorical question. Morales wants very much to fight in what will be his final bout at 122 pounds.

Promoter Bob Arum has big plans for Morales if he gets past Barrera. Arum wants to match Morales against the winner of the fight for the vacant WBC featherweight title between Lusito Espinosa and Guty Espadas.

And if Morales is successful there, his biggest fight yet looms, one against the undefeated Prince Naseem Hamed (33-0, 29 knockouts), the WBO featherweight title holder.

But first Barrera.

Ever since Julio Cesar Chavez’s fade, the search has been on for the man worthy of assuming his unofficial title of Mexico’s greatest fighter.

Barrera appeared to be that man, especially after his unforgettable battle against Kennedy McKinney in 1996 at the Great Western Forum. There were six knockdowns, five by Barrera, before he finally won on a technical knockout in the 12th round.

But then came Junior Jones.

Jones handed Barrera both of his defeats, one on a controversial disqualification, the other on a decision.

With Barrera blemished, the search for the next Chavez centered on Morales, the tough, quick, dedicated slugger whose speed once enabled him to land two punches on a single knockout, the second blow delivered to Angel Chacon sending him through the ropes as he was on his way down from the first.

The 23-year-old Morales is determined to leave his weight division a winner.

“I have to win this fight because it is for honor and very personal,” he said.

Said the 26-year-old Barrera, “Because of our styles, I expect it to be a toe-to-toe fight with someone going down. It doesn’t matter to me how I win. I have 12 rounds in me.”

And perhaps the early psychological edge.

Said Maldonado with a sly smile after prevailing in the battle of the gloves, “I think we just won the first round.”

SHORT JABS

The on-again, off-again Felix Trinidad-Oscar De La Hoya rematch may be on again. Promoters Don King and Arum have hammered out the key details, according to Arum, agreeing on a 50-50 split of the revenue for a fight on June 17.

Still to be convinced is Felix Trinidad Sr., the fighter’s manager-trainer. Of course, both fighters also must win their next bouts, which they took after negotiations for a rematch broke down.

Trinidad won the first meeting in September on a decision. De La Hoya will fight Derrell Coley next Saturday in New York. Trinidad fights David Reid March 3 in Las Vegas.

Chavez is off the Trinidad-Reid card, either because of an injury or a dispute over money, depending on who is telling the story.