Friday Night Fights hits Ronan Community Center

By Trent Makela/Leader Staff

Mixed martial arts fighters are highly-trained athletes who could dispatch your typical street-brawler with ease. They seem to have trouble with inexperienced cow-hands, though.

Ronan resident and local cow puncher Tony "Pretty Boy" Peretto got into the first fight of his life and nearly rode a full hometown crowd to victory when the Friday Night Fights came to the Ronan Community Center last week.

Club Boxing out of Butte organized the event and a total of 18 local fighters took to the ring for a chance to win $125 with a victory or $50 for a loss.

Peretto originally grew up outside of Detroit, but made his way to Montana to become a hunting guide just two years go. His only training for the match was moving livestock at the Cheff Guest Ranch. His only experience with mixed martial arts had been watching his friend in a couple of matches.

"That's about all the experience I've got," Peretto said. "It was kind of scary, but at the same time can't let that effect you or you're definitely going to get your [butt] beat."

Peretto agreed to step up a weight class to fight Missoula-trained MMA fighter Julian Hendrickson, and opened up a gash over the fighter's eye in the opening round. Sheer guts and dozens of well-placed punches appeared to have Peretto well on his way to a victory before a third-round submission hold forced him to tap out.

"I actually felt pretty confident going in. I told myself I wasn't going to lose in front of everyone unless he submitted me," Peretto said. "Unfortunately that happened. He said he'd been training for about a year-and-a-half. That was just my experience showing through - I didn't know how to avoid all the submissions."

A large crowd of Peretto's coworkers and friends from the Cheff Ranch led the crowd in support of the closest match of the day. The Center also roared it's approval when it was announced that the pair has tentatively agreed to a rematch when the fights return this August.

There was only one other MMA fight on the night's card, as Polson's DJ O'Rourke also took to the ring for his first organized fight against Don Webster. O'Rourke also appeared to be on his way to an underdog victory before giving the crowd a scare by losing consciousness in his corner after the second round.

Emergency response crews carried O'Rourke outside before he came around and sent a message to the crowd that he had "just ran out of gas".

Seven boxing matches rounded out the nights card, and peaked with the night's final heavyweight bout between Ronan natives Tommy "The Train" Parker and Sonny "Son Dogg" Burke.

Parker had won his bout on the prior weekend at the Mission Valley Rumble in St. Ignatius, and referee Russ Sherman encouraged him to try his hand against an adult in Ronan.

"It was a lot harder [than the Mission Valley Rumble]," Parker said. "I guess the guy I fought was a street brawler."

The two heavyweights traded heavy blows for two rounds before Parker, who had trained for a month up to the fight, used his endurance to out-point Burke in the third.