By Keith Idec
Leo Santa Cruz feels more confident following a stress-free training camp for his rematch against Carl Frampton than he did prior to their first fight.
Jose Santa Cruz, Leo’s father and life-long trainer, missed most of that first Frampton camp because he was recovering from cancer treatments. Jose Santa Cruz has been with his son throughout this training camp, though, which leaves Leo Santa Cruz certain he is more properly prepared for this difficult fight Saturday night in Las Vegas (Showtime).
“This time, having him there in the gym with me,” Santa Cruz said during a conference call last week, “he's telling me specifically like what punches I have to throw with Frampton, how to fight him and stuff like that. And he's always there, pressuring me. He pushes me and gives me that extra motivation and everything.”
With their father confined to a wheelchair for most of that first Frampton camp, Leo’s older brother, Antonio, filled in as his head trainer. Leo Santa Cruz says that impacted game-planning more than anything as they prepared at the Who’s Next Boxing Academy in La Puente, California.
“In the first camp, I didn’t have my dad with me,” Santa Cruz said. “And me and my brother were doing something that we thought was going to be a good game plan. But, you know, my dad is smart when it comes to that. My dad is the one who’s always watching boxing. He’s always watching different styles of different boxers and he knows how to fight different styles.
“Since my dad wasn’t here, we didn’t come with a big game plan. We had one thing, we had trained [for] one thing with my brother, and then when my dad got there, he wanted us to train a different way. So we got confused. We got a little bit frustrated. This time we’re going to go perfectly fine and we’re not going to have any problems.”
Jose Santa Cruz worked his son’s corner for the first Frampton fight, which Leo Santa Cruz lost on two of three scorecards July 30 at Barclays Center in Brooklyn. One judge scored the action-packed fight even (114-114), but Northern Ireland’s Frampton (23-0, 14 KOs) won on the other two cards (117-111, 116-112) and took the WBA world featherweight championship from Santa Cruz by majority decision.
The 28-year-old Santa Cruz contends he is more than capable of employing the smarter game plan that his father has designed during this training camp. The former three-division champion typically applies pressure throughout fights and tries his best to deliver entertainment consistently to boxing fans.
Santa Cruz, of Rosemead, California, said he’ll be more tactical against Frampton the second time around.
“We’re going to go [in] with a great game plan, to go out there and try to beat Frampton,” Santa Cruz said. “You know, [my dad is] always there telling me how to beat him and now that I have him there, we’re going to have no problems when we get in the fight.”
Whatever occurs Saturday night at MGM Grand Garden Arena, Santa Cruz is extremely thankful that his father has conquered Stage 3 multiple myeloma, a cancer that affects plasma cells in bone marrow. Jose Santa Cruz’s intense treatment included chemotherapy and spinal surgery.
“In the first camp,” Leo Santa Cruz said, “I was worrying more about him, about his health, how he was doing, if he was going to be able to go to the fight with me. Or if he was even going to wake up the day after, tomorrow, to be there with us because cancer is a very dangerous disease that you could be here with us today, or tomorrow you won’t be here with us.”
“Now, thank God, the cancer is in remission, in complete remission. But he’s doing a lot better and so my mind is clear. And the only thing on my mind is the fight, that I want to go out there and do a great fight for all the fans. And hopefully it will be another ‘Fight of the Year.’ ”
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.
