(Photo: Showtime Sports) By Jim Dower: IBF bantamweight champion Leo Santa Cruz (22-0-1, 13 KO’s) is making a pretty good case for him being the most exciting fighter in the bantamweight division. Earlier tonight, the 24-year-old Santa Cruz stopped the incredibly game Victor Zaleta (20-3-1, 10 KO’s) by a 9th round TKO at the Stapes Center in Los Angeles, California.
Santa Cruz knocked Zaleta down three times in the fight – the 4th, 7th and 9th rounds. The stoppage came from a hard right hand to the head of Zetala that put him down in the 9th. The two other knockdowns came from left hands to the body from Santa Cruz.
On both occasions that Santa Cruz had Zaleta hurt and down from body shots, he failed to immediately follow up with additional body punches. It was as if he was letting Zaleta hang around for the sport of it because Santa Cruz didn’t do the right things when he had him badly hurt.
Both fighters went toe-to-toe for 9 rounds and it was incredible to watch. Zaleta didn’t have Sana Cruz’s power, but he never stopped throwing his own shots. He made it a really tough fight simply by throwing shots back. This kind of fight had to have taken out of both guys there so many head shots. Santa Cruz looked like a smaller version of Antonio Margarito and averaged over 100 punches thrown per round and with incredibly accuracy and big power. The sounds of Santa Cruz landing his shots was really loud and hard to miss.
After the fight Santa Cruz mentioned wanting to fight WBC super bantamweight champion Abner Mares if he were interested.
You got to give Zaleta a ton of credit for being able to take Santa Cruz’s hard shots and last as long as he did because he really took a lot of punishment in this fight. It’s hard to imagine many fighters that would be willing to absorb that kind of punishment without giving or getting stopped. If Zaleta had a little more power I think he could have made things really interesting and possibly won. That was the difference in the fight. Santa Cruz had the power, and Zaleta was just a tad weaker.
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