PHOENIX: This is a fight for territory, both in terms of weight and on a map that denotes where home and heart are.
Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez has made his declaration already. He’s back in a city that has a reputation for appreciating the lowest weight classes for the second time in a row, maybe because it’s also home to Hall of Fame junior flyweight Michael Carbajal, who was the first to make heavyweight headlines and earn money for the underdogs.
A few streets from a street that was renamed after Carbajal in May, Rodriguez, a young Mexican-American from San Antonio, will make his comeback on Saturday night at Footprint Center, a downtown NBA arena.
In 1992, Carbajal assisted in the opening of the Suns’ home. “Bam” aims to make some history at flyweight by competing against Juan Francisco Estrada at 115 pounds, which some boxing organizations refer to as junior bantamweight. However, it would be analogous to treating the Super Bowl like any other football game.
This one only fits “SuperFly.”
Unreasonably high expectations are not taken into consideration by a typical narrative of the tape. It also fails to explain how two combatants from different eras, Rodriguez and Estrada, came to this location at a crucial juncture in history, at the proper moment and place.
The narrative of Bam is being recounted more and more. As the greatest American in the lightest weight class since Carbajal, he goes up against Estrada looking to improve his record in terms of pounds gained.
He fell to the bottom of the pound-for-pound rankings after stopping U.K. flyweight Sunny Edwards in the ninth round at Desert Diamond Arena in suburban Glendale in December.
It is no accident that Edwards, who was applauded at the opening bell for his trash talk and jeered for his valiant effort at Desert Diamond, will likewise be making his Phoenix debut for the first time since suffering a devastating defeat to former champion Adrian Curiel on Saturday’s undercard.
But the fascinating tale of Estrada gets buried in all of this.
Similar to Rodriguez and Edwards, Estrada is visiting Phoenix for the second time in a row.
In a trilogy battle at Desert Diamond in December 2022, he defeated little-guy great Roman “Chocolatito” Gonzalez by majority decision in an unforgettable display of tactical brilliance and grace.
Since then, he has not played, which begs the legitimate issue of whether ring rust will hurt the 34-year-old’s prospects against the competitive and forceful Rodriguez, who is a decade younger at 24.
Yet Estrada claims he’s prepared.
“I’ve spent the entire time in the gym,” he said. It’s not as if I haven’t been working lately. We had really wanted to fight Bam, but we had considered fighting [fellow junior bantamweight titleholder] Kazuto Ioka. The chance was present. I’ve been wanting to fight Bam for a long now.
After defeating Carlos Cuadras in February 2022 at Footprint, Rodriguez is making Phoenix his second home. However, one could make a strong case that Estrada is more comfortable at home than Bam or any other player on Matchroom’s Phoenix (DAZN) card.
About 215 miles to the south of the ring Estrada will enter on Saturday night is his birthplace.
His early years were spent at Puerto Penasco, a fishing village near the mouth of the Gulf of California. In Phoenix, where gringos refer to it as Rocky Point, the location is well-known. The nearest beach in Arizona is renowned for its bleak beauty, which is generated by rolling dunes in the desert next to crystal-clear, shrimp-filled blue seas.
It’s far away. Growing up in such a harsh environment with such stark differences may have helped Estrada become the calm, collected warrior that the world knows him for.
He was raised in a family of fishermen and may have become one himself had not unfortunate events taken his parents away when he was only 7 years old.
First, he lost his mother to leukemia.
His father then perished in an accident.
Estrada said, “Like so many others, he fished for a living.” “He passed away while fishing.”
According to Estrada, his father perished while diving to recover and fix equipment.
He said, “His scuba tanks failed.”
That meant years of living with aunts, uncles, and cousins for 7-year-old Estrada. He mostly battled his sadness and his desire to be a professional fighter rather than a fisherman. He first relocated to Culiacan, then to Hermosillo.
“I went to Hermosillo when I was fifteen,” Estrada remembered, speaking via an interpreter. “Well, I have no parents,” I would think to myself when I saw my relatives and siblings there. To succeed in life, I have to put all into it.
According to Estrada, he still goes fishing with family and friends in the productive seas of Puerto Penasco.
He says he has no idea how many people will be able to get to Phoenix from the north, over the border and across the Sonoran desert. However, he adds, some people are certain to be there to see a well-known fisherman’s kid who is still striving to be someone.
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