Should Santa Cruz do Frampton a favor by fighting in Belfast?

By Boxing News - 01/31/2017 - Comments

Image: Should Santa Cruz do Frampton a favor by fighting in Belfast?

By Scott Gilfoid: Carl Frampton (23-1, 14 KOs) lost a close 12 round majority decision last Saturday night to Leo Santa Cruz (33-1-1, 18 KOs) at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada. Immediately after the fight, Frampton worked hard at urging Santa Cruz to do him a favor by not only giving him another rematch but also agreeing to do it in Belfast, Northern Ireland for their trilogy fight.

Frampton is basically asking Santa Cruz for two favors in one after he already got a big favor from his management by agreeing to fight the first fight in New York, which was in front of a pro-Frampton crowd.

Frampton should have pushed Santa Cruz to fight last Saturday’s rematch in Belfast rather than in Las Vegas. I mean, I think it would have been unfair as heck for Santa Cruz if he had to fight in Belfast after fighting in front of what amounted to be a home fight for Frampton in New York.

Frampton doesn’t have anything that he can offer Santa Cruz to make him want to fight in Belfast, which is why he kept bringing up how he had told him that he would fight him in Belfast. Santa Cruz shouldn’t let himself agree to things like rematches. That’s not his job. It’s his management’s job to make decisions on rematches and venues for fights.

Santa Cruz is the A-side after winning the second fight. The last thing he should be doing is giving up his A-side power to agree to let Frampton fight in Belfast in front of his own boxing fans. I don’t think for a second that Santa Cruz can win a decision in Belfast. I do not see that as possible. The fight that we saw last Saturday, I think Frampton would have won the fight EASILY in my opinion if it had taken place in front of his home boxing fans in Belfast. I’m not saying that the judges would openly cheat Santa Cruz. I’m saying that the screaming of Frampton’s fans would unconsciously influence the judges’ scoring of the fight, which is what some boxing fans believed happened in the first fight in New York. The crowd was on Frampton’s side from round one, and he ended up winning a fight that many fans thought Santa Cruz should have won.

Frampton’s pressure was such that he even had Santa Cruz willing to give him what he wants by agreeing to fight him in Belfast. I think that would be dumbest move that Santa Cruz could make. Santa Cruz was already robbed of a victory over Frampton in their first fight in New York in the minds of a lot of boxing fans, and he was almost robbed in his rematch last Saturday.

The scores of both fights made no sense. They had Frampton doing much better than he appeared to. Last Saturday’s fight was scored 115-113, 115-113 for Santa Cruz, and 114-114 even. I scored the same fight 10 rounds to 2 for Santa Cruz, and I was being very merciful to Frampton in giving him 2 rounds, because I really only saw him winning 1 round in the entire fight. I gave him a second round out of sympathy.

Here’s where Frampton bellyached after the fight last Saturday night by saying he wants the third fight in Belfast:

“I want to fight Leo again, straight away,” Frampton said. “I won the first fight. He won the second. Let’s just do it straight away. I want to fight in Belfast next. That’s what I want to do. I feel like I’ve been on the road for two years now. My fans are having to pay a lot of money to support me and I want to thank them. I would like to repay them with a fight at home and hopefully that can happen. But again, I think the decision was fair tonight. I think it was fair in the first fight (in July in Brooklyn). So let’s get it right and settle the score in number three.”

Frampton talks about his fans having to pay a lot of money to travel to the U. S to watch him fight Santa Cruz, but that’s how it goes sometimes. Look at Santa Cruz’s boxing fans. They had to fly all the way from Los Angeles, California to see him fight Frampton in New York.

Frampton has a ton of Irish fans supporting him in his first fight with Santa Cruz in New York. That was a pro-Frampton crowd on the night. Those weren’t all Irish fans that flew over to the UY.S to see him fight. There were reportedly a lot of Irish boxing fans in New York that showed up to see Frampton fight Santa Cruz. You can argue that it wasn’t even an away fight for Frampton, because he was in front of his own supporters.

When Frampton had to fight Santa Cruz in the rematch last Saturday night in Las Vegas, then you can say that Frampton was fighting in front of a non-Frampton crowd. That crowd seemed more supportive of Santa Cruz, which definitely helped him in the second half of the fight when he started to dominate.

Santa Cruz said after the fight that he would talk to his management about the third fight against Frampton. Well, Santa Cruz should go ahead and do that, but I’m hoping his management has their thinking caps on when they make the decision on whether to let him fight Frampton in Belfast because I think it would be a terrible idea. If I were Santa Cruz’s manager, I wouldn’t let him fight in Belfast. I might agree to let Santa Cruz fight Frampton in London, England, but only if the fight takes place at Wembley Stadium in front of a pack of fans. If Santa Cruz can get the major portion of the gate for a fight at Wembley with him getting 75% of the green stuff for the gate, then I think it would be worth it to fight at Wembley Stadium. But it wouldn’t be a good idea for Santa Cruz to put himself at a disadvantage for a third fight against Frampton. The way that the first two fights were scored in a way that didn’t reflect either fight that took place, I could see a fight in Belfast being even more slanted in Frampton’s favor when it comes to the scoring.

“I’m a man of my word and a true champion will go anywhere,” Santa Cruz said. “I know the crowd will be all for him and it’s going to be really hard. I’m willing to go over there. A true champion goes anywhere. If they want to make a trilogy, I’m up for it. But there are many options out there, too.”

This is what I was afraid of. Santa Cruz has already been talked into it by Frampton asking him to do him a favor by fighting him in Belfast for the third fight. Santa Cruz needs to step back and analyze things before he agrees to them. He can’t be making snap judgments after a 12 round fight. He needs to let some time go by and think clearly whether it’s best to fight Frampton again at all.

If Santa Cruz does want to fight Frampton a third time, then he should use his A-side leverage to push to have the fight in front of his own boxing fans in Los Angeles, because those fans have had to travel to see him, and they’ve spent a lot of money. It’s time that Santa Cruz gives them a present by fighting in front of them in Los Angles. I’m just saying.