Rolando “El Pochito” Reyes is seated in a makeshift locker room, his face a study in quiet calm and focused intensity, while his manager tapes up his hands.

When Reyes steps into the boxing ring tonight, he will be the show’s main event. But most of the crowd gathering outside has not heard of the fighter. This is, after all, only the sixth bout in his professional career, and this is definitely not Las Vegas.

It’s the Sagebrush Cantina, a popular Calabasas watering hole and restaurant that, tonight, has been turned into a fight club.

So-called “club fights” are nothing new in the industry, or in the San Fernando Valley. But they are rarely held in restaurants. Sagebrush Cantina hosted its first fight last fall, and now hopes to make the attraction a regular feature three or four times a year.

“You want to keep your customers happy, so you do things they enjoy and talk about,” said Bob McCord, the restaurant’s owner. “It’s nicer doing this than spending a lot of money on TV and radio advertising.”

About 900 people have come to see the “Showdown at the Sagebrush,” paying $30 for a ringside seat and $20 for general admission to the show set up under the stars in an area of the restaurant’s parking lot. Some are regulars who have never before been to a live boxing match. Others are fight fans who are first-timers at the restaurant.

Fight promoter Robert Valdez, president of Primitive Sports Promotions in Oxnard, became acquainted with Sagebrush when the restaurant sponsored another fight he produced. After several visits to the restaurant, Valdez decided it would make a good venue and pitched the management on the idea of holding regular boxing matches there.

A diverse audience

“There’s everybody from doctors to bikers and lawyers and sports fanatics (who come to the Sagebrush Cantina), but they all seem to get along,” said Valdez. “I don’t know of any other restaurant that gets away with that.”

The first fight at the Cantina, held last October, drew about 850 attendees, “about 350 more than I expected,” Valdez said, and put to bed the concerns about staging a boxing match at the restaurant. “We answered everyone’s questions, including the fire chief and the Sheriff’s Department and the owners. We had no fights other than the one we paid for.”

Valdez, who with his partner Victor S. Martinez began promoting local boxing events about five years ago (mostly in Indian casinos), covers all the costs of the fight in exchange for proceeds from the gate. The restaurant bears the cost of the additional employees required to handle the additional traffic for the evening one extra manager, two more bouncers and the restaurant’s full staff of 14 cocktail waitresses and reaps the benefit in added beverage and food sales.

“It brings in many more people for a Tuesday night,” said Charlie Halstead, the restaurant’s general manager. “It helps build up the dinner crowd.”

Boxing, like professional wrestling, has lately been attracting more fans as cable stations add more programming. ABC Sports, which is planning to revive its “Wide World of Sports” show, will include boxing in that show’s lineup, said Mark Mandel, a network spokesman.

Money behind the matches

Professionals who are starting out (usually with less than 10 fights under their belt) can earn about $500 for a four-round fight, but amateurs are paid with a donation to the gym where they train. That way, a promoter can put on a longer program with, say, five different matches, at a relatively low cost.

Still, “smokers,” as these three-, four- and five-round fights are called, can cost upwards of $18,000 to produce. “My first couple years, I broke even,” said Valdez, who did some boxing himself, as an amateur. “Now I’m making money.”

Most of the cost is picked up by sponsors. “If you look at the Lakers, their salaries (indirectly) come from Nike and Budweiser and Miller,” Valdez said. “Boxing is the same way. We say, ‘How much advertising do we have to sell?’ And go out there and do it.”

Tonight’s crowd includes many of the same white-collar, affluent professionals that make up most of the population of Calabasas.

Reyes is last on the card. He faces his opponent, Diado Kaneko, who’s draped in a neon-blue robe and trunks. At 135 pounds, Kaneko climbs into the ring with a record of five wins, three losses and two draws. But he is no match for Reyes.

The boxer lands a punch that cuts Kaneko’s eye. It’s Reyes by a technical knockout in 4 minutes and 17 seconds.

“This is incredible,” said Jesse Mercado, who had brought his Cub Scout troop, Pack 466, from Chatsworth. “They should have it here all the time.”