A quick glance over the junior lightweight division’s top ten boxers reveals a weight class in transition, one without a clear front-runner. Just as Yuriorkis Gamboa seemed poised to campaign at 130 pounds after growing out of the featherweight class, talks have suddenly popped up of the unbeaten Cuban dynamo skipping the division en route to a clash with lightweight titlist Brandon Rios next year.
Looking to fill the void at the top of the division are a number of young rising contenders like Adrien Broner, Diego Magdaleno and Luis Cruz, the latter of which will see action this Saturday night at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas on the undercard of one of the biggest shows of the year, the Manny Pacquiao-Juan Manuel Marquez third fight.
Cruz (19-0, 15 knockouts), a 26-year-old boxer-puncher from Las Piedras, Puerto Rico, will open up the HBO Pay-Per-View telecast in a ten-round bout against recent featherweight title challenger Juan Carlos Burgos (27-1, 19 KOs), of Tijuana, Mexico. Cruz may be what you call “the house fighter,” as he’s in his second fight with the Top Rank promotional outfit, the show’s promoter, who handle his career along with Miguel Cotto Promotions.
That doesn’t mean this fight is a “gimme” at all.
Burgos, 23, has just one blemish to his record, which was a Fight of the Year candidate for 2010 against Hozumi Hasegawa in Japan for a vacant title belt. Burgos, despite being vastly overshadowed in experience, matched the former bantamweight champion punch-for-punch, stunning him with a left uppercut in the seventh and cutting the favored Hasegawa over the right eye. Hasegawa’s superior accuracy in the final rounds enabled him to pull out the competitive decision.
“Burgos on paper appears to be the best fighter that I have faced,” admitted Cruz, through Cotto Promotions attorney Gaby Pe?agar?cano. “But I’ve had an incredible camp and am ready to make a statement in this fight. I’m certain with my preparation that I’ll be able to win and win convincingly.”
