Why doesn't Steve Smoger get more high profile fights?

[Lance Uppercut]

Smoger is an east coast referee. He'll do the big fights in Atlantic City or New York. But not the west coast ones. Which is why you don't seem him in fights that take place in Vegas or Los Angeles.

So the commissions/promoter prefer to hire regional refs rather than pay to fly in and accommodate those from a different part of the country?

Ref's have to be licensed in the particular state that the fight it held. (which is not as easy as it seems). As noted above Smoger is official ref in several east cost states. Mills Lane and Richard Steel were licensed in Nevada, so you rarely saw them, if ever, ref an east cost fight.