By Robert Morales

Brian Viloria won his first light flyweight world title with a first-round knockout of Eric Ortiz on Sept. 10., 2005 at Staples Center in Los Angeles. The fight was on the undercard of the Manny Pacquiao-Hector Velasquez super featherweight fight, won by Pacquiao via sixth-round technical knockout.

Viloria is a Filipino American born and raised in Hawaii, but he was embraced by the Philippines and was invited there to participate in a celebration honoring his championship.

But even though Viloria won that title in quick and impressive fashion, all was not right with him. Less than four months earlier, Viloria stopped Mexico's Ruben Contreras in the sixth round at Staples Center. Contreras fell unconscious in the aftermath and was rushed to California Medical Center in Los Angeles for emergency brain surgery.

"I had a lot of sleepless nights," said Viloria, who Jan. 23 - Jan. 22 in the U.S. - will defend his current light flyweight title when he takes on Carlos Tamara (20-0, 14 KOs) of Colombia in Manila, Philippines. "I was thinking about it a lot. It weighed heavily on my mind. I told my dad, 'If Ruben dies, I should hang up my gloves.' "

Not only did Contreras survive, he was ringside when Viloria beat Ortiz for the title. As Viloria was making his ring walk, Hall of Fame publicist Bill Caplan motioned

to Viloria that Contreras was there with his wife.

"I was happy," Viloria said. "I was real excited to see him there.

It was almost like a sense of forgiveness for him to come by to the fights and to support me to win a world championship. It lifted a whole lot of weight off my shoulders. I embraced him and hugged him and told him I was sorry for what happened. I don't think he understood what I was saying, but it was an act of forgiveness."

According to Viloria's longtime manager, Gary Gittelsohn, Viloria dispatched Ortiz so quickly he really didn't have time to find out whether he had any existing psychological issues from the beating he had doled out to Contreras.

"The Contreras situation could have heaped psychological scars on anyone, especially someone as sincere and religious as Brian," Gittelsohn said. "Brian was just going through the motions. The Eric Ortiz fight never got a chance to be a fight; he just blew him out in the first round. He just wasn't the same as he was before the Contreras fight."

Eventually, that showed. Viloria defended his title with a 12-round unanimous decision over Jose Antonio Aguirre in February 2006 in Las Vegas. But then he lost his title six months later in Las Vegas, to Omar Nino Romero via wide unanimous decision. Viloria was not himself, and he could barely pull the trigger on his punches.

By that time, his trainer, Freddie Roach, had become a celebrity of sorts, what with his work with Oscar De La Hoya and Pacquiao. Viloria said he just about trained himself for that fight with Romero, but he was quick to point add he harbors no ill will toward Roach because, as Gittelsohn pointed out, Viloria was "pushed down the totem pole by necessity because more attractive fighters were drawing (Roach's) attention."

Viloria said he had other personal problems at the time aside from the thoughts of Contreras in the back of his mind. He also admits he got too caught up in his destruction of Ortiz.

"All the problems fell on top of one another," Viloria said. "I don't want to blame anyone. I think it was more myself being too complacent. I thought I was going to knock out every fighter after I knocked out Ortiz. I got complacent and fell into this lull."

A second fight with Nino resulted in a draw, but the fight was later ruled no contest and the belt held by Nino was declared vacant when Nino did not pass a post-fight drug test.

Viloria - with a new trainer in his corner - then lost to Edgar Sosa via majority decision in a battle for the vacant belt in April 2007. Again, Viloria contemplated retirement. After some reflection, Viloria said he missed the fight game so much he decided to stick with it.

"I felt empty not being in the ring," he said.

He sat down with Gittelsohn, and Gittelsohn told him that if he wanted to again become champion, he was going to have to take a few steps in reverse and re-tool.

Make That Several Giant Steps

It was Jan. 4, 2008, and Viloria had not fought in nearly nine months. For some reason Top Rank Inc. decided to stage a card - televised by Telefutura - outdoors at the Alameda Swap Meet in Los Angeles. Viloria was to take on Jose Garcia Bernal in an eight-round super flyweight fight. It was raining heavily, windy as hell, and the only thing covered by a canopy was the ring and perhaps a few rows of seats. The grounds were flooded.

"It was like attending a cock-fight in a third-world country," Gittelsohn said. "I kept seeing the lighting fixtures on the canopy swaying back and forth. I thought we were in a danger zone."

  

The entire camp of Viloria had to carry him into the ring so as to avoid getting his boxing shoes soaked. Viloria made little money for the fight, but he won a unanimous decision. The road back had begun. He then won an eight-round decision over Cesar Lopez in Las Vegas. Having parted ways with Roach - with whom Viloria and Gittelsohn are still very friendly -Viloria had used two different trainers in the fights with Sosa, Bernal and Lopez.

Viloria then hit the jackpot when he enlisted the services of trainer Robert Garcia, who guided Viloria in his next fight - a third-round knockout of Fred Heberto Valdez - and every one since.

Viloria next won an eight-round unanimous decision over Juan Javier Lagos in El Cajon (near San Diego) and then stopped Benjamin Garcia in the second round in December 2008 back at the Alameda Swap Meet. (In better weather).

None of those fights were at light flyweight, but Viloria had earned himself a shot at his second light flyweight championship. He squared off with Ulises Solis of Mexico last April 19 in the Philippines. A prohibitive underdog, Viloria knocked out Solis in the 11th round.

  

"He went through a gauntlet of hell to get back to where he is now, which was one of the best knockouts of the year," Gittelsohn said.

  

Viloria said that everything he went through in going from the penthouse to the outhouse just added muscle to his emotional constitution.

"When Gary told me I had to take a step back, it wasn't a step back, it was a giant leap backward from what I was used to," said Viloria, who defended his title with a 12-round decision over Jesus Iribe on Aug. 29 in Honolulu. "I understand why I had to go through all that. When people ask me, 'What was your most memorable fight?' I tell them, 'It was that fight at the Alameda Swap Meet.'

That scenario, it's something I look back on.

"That was not the lowest I could go, but there was only one way to go and that was up."

All is good in the life of Viloria, 29. On Christmas Day, he proposed to his longtime girlfriend, Erica Navarro. She accepted.

  

But Viloria (26-2, 15 KOs) has some business to take care of first against Tamara.

"I just have to be the best Brian I can be and I shouldn't have any problems," Viloria said.

Viloria, it appears, is at his best.

Goossen to Mosley: Let's Do This

"Sugar" Shane Mosley recently told BoxingScene.com he considers himself the best welterweight in the world and that he would like to fight any 147-pounder willing to step to the plate, including  Paul Williams Dan Goossen, promoter for former welterweight champion Williams, said Williams would be glad to oblige Mosley, who Jan. 30 will take on Andre Berto at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas.

"It's much safer to say it now when he has already got a fight lined up with Berto," Goossen said. "But we will certainly hold Shane to it. If he is successful in January, which is not a foregone conclusion, let's get a deal done for May."

Goossen said that a fight between Williams and middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik now seems remote; two dates they had scheduled last year fell by the wayside when Pavlik pulled out because of his hand injury.

At this point, Goossen said he is talking to fighters anywhere from the 160-pound middleweight limit down to the 147-pound welterweight class for Williams. Even though three of Williams' past four fights have been at middleweight - the other at junior middleweight - Goossen said Williams would have no problem getting back down to welterweight. It should be noted Williams' highest weigh-in has been 157 pounds, which he weighed for all three of his middleweight bouts.

  

"Nobody believes Paul Williams can get down to 147 and still be dominant," Goossen said. "But we feel the opposite. We feel he can even be more dominant."

All Luevano Wants is R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Steven Luevano is 37-1-1 with 15 knockouts, 5-0-1 in featherweight world championship fights. But Luevano hasn't cracked any top 10 pound-for-pound polls, and in spite of his success, he isn't the hottest of topics.

  

Heck, he remembers one time, after he had already won the title with an 11th-round knockout of Nicky Cook in July 2007, he was watching a ShoBox event featuring Yuriorkis Gamboa. Gamboa - who now holds one of the featherweight titles - wasn't a champion yet. But Luevano said one of the announcers - he couldn't remember which - was talking about who the featherweight champions were at the time.

  

"One of the guys was naming all the champions at featherweight and he mentioned my name and he said, 'Who is not a legitimate champion,' " said Luevano, who will defend his title against Puerto Rican star Juan Manuel Lopez on Jan. 23 at Madison Square Garden.

"And I was like, 'What?' So I rewound it and watched it again to see what he said. And I said, 'What the hell?' "

Luevano said he wanted to make sure there wasn't some other meaning to the word "legitimate," so he looked it up on a computer.

  

"I was like, 'Is he talking s**t, or saying it in a different way?' " Luevano said. "But he was  saying it like I wasn't for real."

  

With only 15 knockouts in 39 fights, Luevano does not have a high knockout ratio. That could be one reason why he is not talked about that much. He is also one of the most unassuming world-class fighters one could find, about as quiet as they come. Shoot, he doesn't even look like a fighter.

You see Luevano and his baby face walking down the street, you'd never know he beats people up for a living.

"I'm not a s**t-talker or anything, I don't call people out," Luevano said. "I'm not the type of person to do stuff like that."

Asked straight out if he believes he has received the credit he deserves for his accomplishments, Luevano said, "I don't think so."

He also said, "It doesn't bother me. I just let people think what they want to think."

At the same time, Luevano, 28, has been boxing since he was 7.

Like anyone who has put 75 percent of his life into something, he wants to be properly acknowledged for his achievements. A victory over Lopez, who is moving up from junior featherweight after establishing himself as the best there, would go a long way in that regard.

"It's going to show everyone what I'm made of," Luevano said. "I guess they (the experts) have Juanma as the pound-for-pound champion at 122. That is why I'm training extra hard for this fight just to show that I'm just as good or even better than what Juanma is. That would show them where I'm at, instead of just them thinking what I'm not.

"It's going to get me better fights, a lot more money and recognized even more."

Like Luevano, Lopez is a southpaw. But whereas Luevano is considered a medium puncher, Lopez (27-0) is looked upon as a heavy hitter, having stopped 24 opponents inside the distance.

"I just have to be cautious of his right hook," Luevano said.

Luevano may not hit all that hard, but he is one of the most technically sound fighters in the business. He also has courage to burn. This should be a good one.

Robert Morales covers boxing for the Los Angeles Daily News, Long Beach Press-Telegram and BoxingScene.com.