By Francisco Salazar - LOS ANGELES, Calif. - It lived up to expectations. Probably exceeded them.
Leo Santa Cruz and Abner Mares brought it for 12 rounds, giving the announced crowd of 13,109 at Staples Center and a television audience many thrills during their back and forth exchanges.
But it was Santa Cruz who had his arm raised in victory, winning by majority decision over 12 rounds to win the WBA Super regular featherweight title.
With the win, Santa Cruz improves to 31-0-1, 17 KOs, while Mares drops to 29-2-1, 15 KOs.
There were many story lines going into the fight. Santa Cruz was trying to shake the stigma of what boxing fans consider to be fighting less than stellar opposition in his last couple of fights. For Mares, some wondered whether he would regain the same form prior to getting stopped by Jhonny Gonzalez over two years ago.
As the fight date approached, boxing fans were eager to watch two aggressive Mexican-American boxers with television-friendly styles put it all on the line in their adopted hometowns around the Los Angeles area.
Boxing fans were not disappointed early on as both fighters went right at one another from the opening bell. Mares was able to get on the inside of Santa Cruz's long reach, landing to the head and body with hooks and crosses.
Mares continued to have success early on, smothering any offense Santa Cruz attempted to launch.
"I was surprised Abner came out so strong," said Santa Cruz after the fight. "He came right at me but we figured him out. My dad told me that we could beat him by boxing."
Santa Cruz began to find success early in the third round, keeping Mares at bay with repeated jabs and right hands that followed. As the bout progressed into the middle rounds, Santa Cruz began to find a rhythm of being first and keeping Mares at the end of his punches.
