By Keith Idec
Carl Frampton doesn’t think Leo Santa Cruz can improve much in their rematch on his performance from their first fight.
The featherweight champion from Northern Ireland won their July 30 bout by majority decision at Barclays Center in Brooklyn. Frampton (23-0, 14 KOs) didn’t throw or land more overall punches than the relentless Santa Cruz (32-1-1, 18 KOs), but he won by sizeable margins on two of the three scorecards (117-111, 116-112, 114-114) and took Santa Cruz’s WBA super world featherweight championship.
“I don’t think he can do much more,” Frampton told BoxingScene.com during a recently completed press tour for their January 28 rematch in Las Vegas. “I read in a recent interview that he said he’s gonna throw more punches. But I think he threw close to 1,100 punches in that last fight. How do you throw much more? I don’t think he’s gonna be able to do anything different, but it’s still gonna be a difficult night for me.
“The difference between a fighter like me and fighter like Leo is I can adapt and I have many different ways I can fight. I can move backward, I can fight on the inside, I can go forward. And that’s the difference. And I learned a lot from the last fight. I believe that it’s gonna be another difficult night, but I’ll win it more convincingly.”
According to unofficial CompuBox statistics, Santa Cruz landed 255-of-1,002 punches during their 12-round fight, 13 more than Frampton (242-of-668). CompuBox credited Frampton for connecting on more power punches (206-of-463) than Santa Cruz (191-of-551), who landed more jabs (64-of-451) than Frampton (36-of-205).
“I think what we need to do different is have a better game plan,” Santa Cruz said, “be smarter and not get carried away, throw punches at the right time and stuff like that. We’re gonna go with a different game plan. With my dad [and trainer, Jose], we’re practicing a different game plan and I think you’re all gonna see it January 28th when we get up in the ring.”
Showtime will televise the Frampton-Santa Cruz rematch from MGM Grand Garden Arena. The doubleheader will begin with another scheduled 12-rounder, which will match Montenegro’s Dejan Zlaticanin (22-0, 15 KOs), the WBC world lightweight champion, against Mikey Garcia (35-0, 29 KOs), a former featherweight and super featherweight champ from Riverside, California.
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.
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