Rios-Antillon bout sure to be entertaining

Associated Press

CARSON, Calif.

Whenever Brandon Rios left sunny Ventura County and traveled home to Garden City, Kan., his trainer and manager feared every phone call.

The rising lightweight prospect constantly found trouble whenever he was around childhood friends and bad influences in that small town in west-central Kansas. Rios already has done several short jail stretches for everything from bar fights to drunk driving, and trainer Robert Garcia constantly wondered whether the next infraction would be life-changing.

“I got one call: ‘I just broke this guy’s jaw, and I don’t know what’s going to happen,”’ Garcia said. “Luckily, the guy took a little bit of money. Whenever he went home, [manager] Cameron [Dunkin] and I were just waiting. It’s even worse because I’d probably consider him my best friend.”

But Rios hasn’t been back to Kansas in nearly two years, not even to see his two children there. He has a wife and another child in Oxnard, and he’s finally focused on a career that reaches a peak tonight at Home Depot Center when he takes on fellow Southern Californian Urbano Antillon in a lightweight title fight between two brawlers who don’t like to box.

“I still haven’t forgotten my hometown, but my wife helped me become more of a man than a childish kid,” said Rios, whose trash talk with Antillon has gone on for a full year since their fight was first announced and rescheduled.

Rios (27-0-1, 19 KOs) won a version of the WBA 135-pound belt with a dramatic come-from-behind stoppage of Miguel Acosta in February, while Antillon (28-2, 20 KOs) is coming off a narrow decision loss to Humberto Soto in a thrilling bout.