"We like the combat sports, the action sports. That’s what runs in the minds and the blood and culture of Puerto Ricans.’’
Â…Miguel Cotto Sr., when asked why, after Roberto Clemente, all the names in the island’s emotional pantheon of super athletic heroes belong to boxers
LAS VEGAS—The names are passed down generation to generation — from trainer to trainer in the steamy gyms, from fathers to sons in the barrios and all across the Island from San Juan to Ponce:
Sixto Escobar, the first Puerto Rican to win a title in 1936 and the first boxer anywhere in the world to have a statue unveiled in his name ... Alfredo Escalera, the junior lightweight champion, who entered the ring time after time with a snake coiled around his neck ... Wilfredo Benitez, at age 17 the youngest world champion ever crowned ... Gomez, Ortiz, Serrano, Trinidad, all of them champions, and all the others.
And now Miguel Cotto Jr. is just a millimeter away from a place among that glory brigade. Last week, behind closed doors at the Top Rank Gym, he was coming down the homestretch for Saturday’s fight of his life against Manny Pacquiao. The music filtering into the lobby from ringside was laced with the down-home Caguas beat that punctuated his every training day. There were no distractions.
There was only the music and the sparring partners and the trainer, Joe Santiago, who spoke softly to him between rounds. This is the way Team Cotto wants it.
Two fights back, Junior took a terrific beating from Antonio Margarito for his only loss. Then Margarito was discovered with a ‘‘foreign’’ substance in his gloves the next time out when Sugar Shane Mosley stopped him. Were his gloves ‘‘loaded’’ against Cotto? Impossible to know but there was no shortage of conjecture. Cotto believes that defeat actually may have led to a blessing in disguise.
As a case in point, listen to something Cotto said when he went into camp in Tampa for this fight with a new trainer, Santiago:
‘‘I was very hurt and depressed after that (Margarito) fight. Then I redid my team. Now, I’m with the people I wanted. Sometimes you win by losing.”
What he ‘‘won’’ was his choice of trainers. His uncle, Evangelista Cotto, is out. The assistant, Santiago, is in. The issue was Evangelista’s insistence on training in Puerto Rico, where he had a stable of other fighters. Junior wanted to train in Tampa, away from the pressure of adoring fans with a trainer that concentrated solely on him.
Junior was right.
He went there with Santiago earlier for his fight against Joshua Clottey and returned to prepare for Pacquiao.
‘‘The best thing we did was to go to Tampa to train for this fight,” Santiago will tell you. ‘‘The training went perfectly. If he had stayed in Puerto Rico, the distractions would have been even more than in the past because this is Pacquiao. We know fans are excited. And we know they don’t understand he needs his time even more for this one because of what beating Pacquiao means to him. They would have been all over him and what would we have gotten done? Too much adoration gets in the way of a fighter in training. They can love you to death.’’
The moment of truth is on the horizon and behind the closed gym doors there are no fans. On this day there is only the music and the shuffling sound of sparring partners moving forward as ordered and Cotto coming off the ropes or out of the corners with a left hook and a series of obligatory combinations — which will take on a far more intense purpose Saturday night.
The work is just about done now.
Santiago assessed the journey like this:
‘‘From the moment this fight was signed, we began with it. I know Manny and what he can bring. We have studied every part of his style. We broke down the tapes. We understand what he can bring. Miguel is in excellent condition. I have no doubt that after this fight, he will belong on that list of our great fighters you mentioned. I personally believe he is already on it.’’
Outside in the lobby, Miguel Cotto Sr., the fraternal head of Team Cotto, is speaking about that slice of proud history that constantly casts a measuring stick of a shadow over all that a Puerto Rican boxer seeks to achieve.
‘‘When he was 12,” he says, ‘‘the people who know about such things said he was a prospect. And from 1996 until the Olympics it was clear he was headed in the right direction. He has a history of winning big fights — fights I believe will prove to have been bigger than this one. For me, he is already there among those names we count as our island’s history.
‘‘But I am a father. How does a father think about his son’s career? When he gets hit, I feel the blows. When he hits back and moves forward, we celebrate. The people who have followed him see how much he learned every year. I think the question about this fight ... the question that is no question for me at all ... is not how Junior can deal with Pacquiao. It is how long can Manny, who is smaller and not really a welterweight, take what Junior throws at him before he falls apart.’’
Those words bring to mind something his son said earlier in the week during a teleconference. Like his father, he believes people are looking at this through a flawed microscope:
‘‘So now he comes to my division to challenge me. His power comes from a lower-weight division and if he thinks that power can beat me, then he is wrong. He has picked the wrong time and the wrong man in the wrong division.’’
But it’s really not quite that simple.
Deep down, everyone on Team Cotto understands a dangerous truth:
A good left hook to the body can make chopped liver of the best of logical equations.
Which is why they still have to fight on Saturday.
Source: nj.com
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