By Juan Flores: Carl “The Jackal” Frampton (23-1, 14 KOs) is already looking past this Saturday’s stay busy fight against Horacio Garcia (33-3-1, 24 KOs) in Belfast towards possible fights against featherweight champions Leo Santa Cruz and Lee Selby.
Frampton, 30, will be fighting the Mexican fighter Garcia this Saturday night on November 18 at The SSE Arena, in Belfast, Northern Ireland. This is the first fight for Frampton since his 12 round majority decision defeat earlier this year to Santa Cruz on January 28 in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Frampton thinks he should have been given the win for that fight, but 2 of the judges thought different. They had Santa Cruz getting the better of Frampton by the scores 115-113 and 115-113. The third judge scored it 114-114. Frampton wants Santa Cruz to come over to Belfast to fight him. Santa Cruz has not seemed eager to take Frampton up on his offer.
“There are so many big fights — even guys without belts — and there are about seven or eight guys I’d be happy to fight,” Frampton told ESPN. “The main one I want is Leo Santa Cruz, it’s one each between us and I’d love him to come this side of the Pond but I doubt he will.”
Those top guys might not be too interested in fighting Frampton in Belfast. After the way Santa Cruz lost to Frampton in New York by a controversial decision in their first fight last year on July 30, it’s unlikely that “The Jackal” will be able to lure any of them over to Belfast.
Frampton beat Santa Cruz in front of a large pro-Frampton crowd in New York last year. The scoring by the judges favored Frampton, even in rounds in which Santa Cruz appeared to win. The only possible reasons to explain the odd scoring by the judges is to say that they might have been influenced by the cheering from the boxing fans that attended the fight.
Frampton also wants to fight the winner of the Lee Selby vs. Josh Warrington fight, which will be taking place next year. In the meantime, Frampton will need to stay busy fighting the best available contenders if he can’t get Santa Cruz to travel to Belfast to fight him.
“So he is someone I want to fight, [Lee] Selby again, him and [Josh] Warrington are going to fight, but at this point in time I’d be confident Selby would win that fight and I’d be happy to fight the winner,” said Frampton.
Selby will definitely face Frampton sooner or later if he gets past Warrington next year. That’s a no-brainer for Selby, as he’ll get a big pay day in fighting Frampton. He might not win it, but he’ll get paid well.
Selby (25-1, 8 KOs) will be in action next month defending his International Boxing Federation title against fringe contender Eduardo Ramirez on December 9 in London, England. This is a standard defense for Selby, who has mostly weak opponents since he won the IBF title 2 years ago.
Warrington is already waiting in the background to fight Selby after beating an over-matched Dennis Ceylan in an IBF 126 pound title eliminator last month on October 21.