Brandon Berry felt as prepared as he could be as the promoter of next weekend’s pro-am boxing show at the Skowhegan Community Center.
A nine-bout amateur card including several local prospects was in place for Saturday’s 7 p.m. event, as was a four-fight professional slate that featured Berry, the veteran West Forks welterweight, in the main event.
Only one problem — Berry’s scheduled opponent just dropped out.
“I would have had a much better story for you yesterday but I lost my opponent this morning so I’m now back on the hunt for another one,” Berry said on Monday. “We’ll find one. I wouldn’t even doubt that by the day’s end I’ll have my fight. It’s just stressful, of course.”
While the 30-year-old Berry has built an 11-2-2 professional boxing record despite three surgeries on his left shoulder that have limited him to six bouts since 2014 and at one point required a 17-month layoff before he returned to the ring last November, he’s finding the promotional side of the sport at times even more unpredictable.
Take the fact that this weekend’s show comes amid a busy New England boxing schedule that also includes cards in Windham, New Hampshire, and Plainville, Massachusetts, on the same night as Berry’s first show in Skowhegan since last July.
“It’s great for boxing but it’s hard for guys like me trying to run small shows because for one, it’s hard to get guys to commit to come all the way to Maine,” he said. “You’ve got to pay them more, everything costs more, and then when they have the opportunity to fight closer to home you might as well give up, there’s no way you’re going to get them to come.
“New England isn’t very big for boxing and Maine is very small, so when there’s another show that same night — and here you have pro shows in Massachusetts and New Hampshire and Maine — all three states use the same judges and referees and it’s hard to get them when there are three different places to be that night.”
Yet Berry is optimistic that he’s assembled a show with considerable variety among its professional and amateur participants.
The pro side also will feature cruiserweight Christiano Pedro of Cugno’s Gym in Lewiston, junior middleweight Casey Kramlich of the Portland Boxing Club and heavyweight Justin Rolfe of Fairfield making his professional debut in separate bouts.
The amateur talent pool ranges from young New England Junior Olympic champion Braden Littlefield of East Benton to three-time national Golden Gloves champion Liz Leddy of the Portland Boxing Club in one of three women’s bouts on the card.
“We have Braden Littlefield who’s only 11, he fought on our show last July and has had a bunch of fights since then so even though he’s young he’s experienced,” said Berry. “Then we have Liz Leddy who’s a Golden Gloves champion with probably close to 100 fights so we really do have a little bit of everything.”
Now there’s just one final act of matchmaking to complete.
“I thought I had a good fight already set up,” Berry said. “I was worried about it, but I guess he was more worried than I was.”
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