In recent years, more and more fighters have taken their shot at competing in both mixed martial arts and professional boxing, to varying degrees of success. Tracy, California’s Pedro Juarez, a bantamweight in MMA, which translates to a lightweight in boxing, will attempt to begin his dual path pro journey this coming Saturday night, when he makes his professional boxing debut against Alec Acuavera in one of the supporting bouts on the Toscano Boxing Promotions event at the Modesto Centre Plaza in Modesto, California.
Juarez, a four-fight professional MMA fighter, actually began his combat sports career as a boxer, despite being drawn in by watching the UFC on television, after finding his way to his first boxing coach, Felipe Martinez.
“I originally started off as a boxer and about 2012 is when I started training,” recalls Juarez. “One of my friends was going to the boxing gym and I had him take me there to Felipe’s Boxing Gym in Lathrop. I wanted to train and I was eager to learn. I started training in boxing and stayed with that because I didn’t really see MMA training. Once I started going to the boxing gym, I liked it and stuck with boxing for a long time. It was at his house, in his backyard. He had a ring and he had bags. He would train all the local kids. He would train a lot of fighters and was a cool guy. He wouldn’t charge a lot of people. We would just come over and train. Eventually, later down the road, I transitioned to MMA.”
Eventually, Juarez decided to pursue the combat sport that originally caught his eye, mixed martial arts, which led him to the well-regarded Oakdale MMA Last Stand Fight Team, led by Tom Theofanopoulos, more than 35 miles from his native Tracy.
“At some point, I kind of ended up losing interest in boxing,” explains Juarez. “I went through a little rough period where, I don’t know, I just lost the passion. So I thought, I’ll transition into MMA, since that was what got me to start training, because I started watching it on TV. So I thought I’d make the transition and see how it went. I ended up going over to Oakdale MMA. I tried it and I liked it and have stuck with it ever since.”
Before turning professional in 2022, the highlight of Juarez’s amateur MMA career would be winning the 209 Beatdown bantamweight title over Raul Godinez at the Modesto Centre Plaza in 2019. Juarez would have to overcome some adversity before scoring the split decision victory to claim the title as Godinez landed an uppercut seconds into the bout that broke Juarez’s jaw.
“We had a good fight,” remembers Juarez. “I ended up getting the win, but it was tough though, getting my jaw broken in the first round and having to battle through that, but I stayed in there. Stayed composed and got the win.”
Nearly two years to the day after Juarez scored the biggest win of his amateur MMA career, the Tracy native was slated to make his professional debut as part of Bellator 266, which was televised by Showtime from the SAP Center in San Jose, California. Unfortunately for Juarez, that fight would not come to pass.
“Everything was going good with training, but the week of the fight, something was going on with my MRI,” remembers Juarez. “They didn’t communicate that to us, so by the time we found out, there wasn’t enough time to follow-up and see what was going on. So the commission said he’s not cleared to fight and they scrapped it. I was there fight week. I was at the hotel and doing everything you have to do during fight week. On Wednesday, when they told us, it sucked, but everything happens for a reason I guess. After everything happened, I was really bummed out for a while. That was a really big opportunity, to turn pro under Bellator, the second biggest promotion out there as far as MMA, and when it fell through, it was devastating, but there wasn’t anything I could do really.”
Juarez would go on to turn professional in MMA a year after the scuttled bout in San Jose. While pursuing his pro MMA career out of Oakdale MMA, Juarez saw an opportunity to bring one of his old boxing coaches, Alfredo Perez, on board the team when the fight compound expanded to include a boxing gym and program.
“I have known Alfredo for a long time, since my early boxing days,” explains Juarez. “I was able to connect him to Oakdale MMA, because my MMA coach, Tom Theofanopoulos, is the instructor and owner of Oakdale MMA and he was looking to start a boxing program and looking for coaches. I linked up Alfredo and him and they made it work.”
Before the COVID pandemic forced his gym, the Boxing Development Center in Oakdale, to close, Perez got to know and worked with Juarez during his amateur boxing run. The two forged a relationship and bond and with Perez in place at Oakdale MMA, Juarez could return to boxing with a familiar coach when the opportunity presented itself.
“We have a really good relationship and I kind of look after him like he’s one of my own,” says Perez. “He’s just a really good kid; respectful, humble and a lot of class. The kid works hard. He’s got a day job, he goes and works eight hours and then comes out all the way to Oakdale almost every day. Sometimes I even have to back him down a little bit and tell him to get some rest so he doesn’t overtrain.”
With four pro MMA fights under his belt, Juarez had been slated for fight number five this past September. However, when promoters for the event could not find him an opponent, Juarez looked toward this coming Saturday’s event on the calendar as an opportunity to get back into the boxing ring.
“Pedro let me know he wanted to continue in boxing as well,” says Perez. “I said, ‘If you really want to do this, we have to do it 100 percent. We can’t half ass it.’ He’s always been a pretty good boxer. The transition was really not hard at all, it actually was pretty easy. He already has the skill set of stand-up. Working with him on mitts and taking him sparring and everything, we took him a couple different places, just to see where we were at three or four months ago, and he’s a totally different person. He’s in shape and ready to go.”
Juarez, with the help of his team, has made the adjustments in the gym necessary to make the move from preparing for a mixed martial arts bout to making his professional boxing debut.
“At first, it was a little different, because I am used to throwing kicks and the range is different,” explains Juarez. “But once I just focused solely on boxing and got into the groove of things, I was able to switch my mindset to that of just a boxer. I just focused a lot on my hands the last eight to ten weeks. It feels comfortable. I feel good.”
Juarez will meet Alec Acuavera of Pittsburg, California, a fellow MMA fighter making his pro boxing debut, on Saturday in Modesto. Acuavera is somewhat of an unknown to the Juarez camp, who have made their preparation more about preparing Juarez rather than focusing on their match-up.
“I have seen a couple of his fights, just to get an idea,” says Juarez. “But I have just been focused on me and what I am going to do.”
“To be honest, I don’t know anything about him,” admits Perez. “I saw a little video of him in one of his fights, but that is all I know. I believe he’s a little bit taller and probably a little longer. So in our camp, we had some guys that were a little bit taller than Pedro. So that helped with our game plan and what we are going to do, come this Saturday.”
Juarez will become the first boxer to turn professional out of Oakdale MMA, which opened in 1988. As the first pro out of the boxing program, Juarez is someone the younger aspiring boxers and fighters look up to as they aim to achieve their dreams.
“We have our amateurs that fight out of here and the kids like to see him and get excited,” explains Perez. “A few of them might even stop him for an autograph and Pedro gets a kick out of that. I told him, ‘You are inspiring kids and you have to use that platform so they can see that they can do this too.’ He definitely is inspiring them and sometimes he will even work out with some of the amateurs that are getting ready to compete. He’s definitely an inspiration at the gym.”
Juarez plans on scoring a victory in his pro boxing debut this weekend and carrying that momentum into an MMA bout on November 15th in Wheatland, California. Should he come out unscathed in those bouts, Perez hopes Juarez can return to the boxing ring before the end of December. It is an ambitious plan, but Juarez seems ready to take on the challenge, beginning with Acuavera this Saturday in Modesto in a fight that takes place at the same venue of his biggest MMA victory in 2019.
“I am excited to be going back to my first sport, because boxing is the first sport that I ever did,” says Juarez. “I am a boxer at heart. Doing a pro fight, that is always something that I wanted to do anyway. Now that the opportunity came, I jumped on it. I am excited to go out there and represent my team, the Last Stand Fight Team and Oakdale MMA.”
Tickets for the Saturday’s event, promoted by Toscano Boxing Promotions, are available online at Ticketon.com
Mario Ortega Jr. can be reached at [email protected]
