Eimantas Stanionis is to prioritise “clearing his head” after struggling for motivation in the build-up to his return to the ring.
The welterweight on Saturday fought for the first time in Lithuania, where in his home city of Kaunas he eased to a unanimous decision over South Africa’s Jabulani Makhense.
He lost for the first time when in April he sacrificed his WBA title in a unification fight with the then-IBF champion Jaron “Boots” Ennis; Saturday’s homecoming contest represented his first date since his first defeat.
Instead of fighting with a point to prove he fought with the weight of “1,000 rocks” on his back, however, and he revealed that his desire to fight has been undermined by the sense that his career has stalled.
Until his sixth-round defeat by Ennis, Stanionis was considered the world’s second finest welterweight. Ennis has since moved to junior middleweight and is expected to compete for a similar status there; that he fights Uisma Lima on October 11 is a reflection of how quickly the defeated Stanionis, even when he has struggled for motivation, returned to the ring.
“I don’t know, honestly,” the Lithuanian responded when asked when he expects his next fight to be. “I just want a little bit of a vacation because even before the Ennis fight I wondered what I wanted to do next. ‘Do I want to box? Don’t I want to box?’ This is playing out in my head.
“Waiting two years for a fight, then getting a fight, then waiting one year to fight Ennis – all these things. In three years I had only two fights. It’s not normal. If you want to be on top you have to be active. I’m glad I got this fight here in my hometown, so now we’ll see. I just want to clear my head. Sometimes you need to fix your head before you want to step in the ring.”
He was then asked whether that meant that at 31 he was considering his future as a fighter and he responded: “Not considering – I love the boxing. But my head’s not in the right space, for a long time, so I need a break to be a little bit with myself. What I can do; what I want.
“The last one-and-a-half year I was training only on discipline. Zero motivation – I had zero motivation. Nothing at all. I was always sad. I was always complaining; in a bad mood. ‘I don’t like this; I don’t like that.’ I like everything to be scheduled, you know? I’m that kind of person. When I know the date; when I know who I’m fighting; how to prepare. When there’s some issues I get lost and I don’t like it. I felt a little bit depressed after all this working period. Now is better. Now, after the fight, I feel like – oh my god – some 1,000 rocks came from my back.
“[My performance] was okay. After that time, after that performance in the last fight, it was different because I’m fighting in my hometown; a lot of people; it’s crazy. I felt a lot of pressure because my mum came; my wife; it was a little bit of pressure and a lot of the people who saw me fighting in America came here to see me, so I was nervous before the fight. But everything went well.
“It’s always good to win. But I’m not satisfied with my performance. I always think I want to be better all the time. There’s no perfect time, but coming back to winning is always good.”
Stanionis’ final preparations for Ennis unfolded while his wife Emily remained in Lithuania to give birth to their first daughter. Instead of under the LA-based Marvin Somodio he then prepared for the 32-year-old Makhense under his long-term amateur trainer Vidas Bruzas and away from the revered Wild Card gym.
“Training camp wasn’t as I wanted it to be; as planned,” he said. “Some stuff was going on. I wanted to do a training camp in Lithuania. I got some sparring – everything – some things I need to fix and figure out what I want to do next with my team.
“I knew I was going into a tough fight [against Ennis]. I knew he was good and I prepared well, everything, but after that fight I was really unhappy with my team [for withdrawing me]. I was in the fight. They’ve maybe never seen me like this but I always call myself a ‘warrior’ and I always told everybody ‘If I lose, I lose on my shield; I’ll get knocked out or something.' That training camp and all that time – I was over-trained. Most of the time I got to the ring over-trained – I don’t know why, what’s with my work? One month I feel good; later on when I was in LA training I wanted to fly home to see my family, chill a little bit and come to the fight night maybe I’d have felt better. But, everything was okay, just – what happened. There’s always a chance [of victory] until you can’t walk or move in the ring.
“It’s good [being a father]. It’s a big blessing. I never had a perfect family so I want to have a wife, be a husband and be an example for your kids. That’s the most important thing for me. It’s motivating; everything. After that fight [against Ennis] we arranged another fight in my hometown; it was a lot of promotion; a lot of feeling. My wife took all the hard work. I was always stressing, because [for other fighters] when you’re trying to give your energy to your wife, to your kid, then you’re sometimes not going to have energy for training. But I’m very happy, and I’m lucky I have a good wife who takes care of everything; my training is the priority for her and for the family.”
