by David P. Greisman
There were more than 9,000 people in Barclays Center watching the featherweight title fight between Leo Santa Cruz and Carl Frampton, and a significant amount of them were there in support of Frampton.
New York City traditionally has a sizable Irish population, and a good contingent had flown in from Frampton’s home of Northern Ireland.
“These people paid a lot to get out here,” Frampton said at the post-fight press conference. “It’s not cheap to get to New York from back home, especially after the football, the European championship. People paid a lot of money to go to the Euros. I think that probably affected how many tickets we sold. But they spurred me on and helped me a lot. The noise was great in there.”
This was only Frampton’s second appearance in the United States; he beat Alejandro Gonzalez Jr. in Texas in July 2015. He’d love to come back.
“I want to fight here, but I want to fight at home,” Frampton said. “I want to fight in Belfast at least once a year. But I love New York. The East Coast is very appealing to me. Maybe it wouldn’t be a bad idea to hit the West Coast at some stage as well. But I’m a Belfast boy. I love my fans back home. I don’t want to have them spend so much money to come and see me all the time.”
Frampton last fought in Belfast in his February 2015 victory over Chris Avalos, the tail end of six consecutive appearances there. Sandwiched between the Texas and New York fights was a fight against Scott Quigg in Manchester.
New York isn’t the fight capital of the United States. Las Vegas is. It’s still not tops on Frampton’s list.
“Vegas would be nice, too, why not? But I’ve said it before: New York and the East Coast is more appealing to me than Vegas,” he said.
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