“I know he’s [Brian Vera] motivated, I know he wants this win big…[but] I’m not 100% super-motivated with [fighting] Brian Vera.”
You don’t say!
The day before stepping in the ring and dropping a split decision loss to Brian Vera, Sergio “The Latin Snake” Mora spoke to Joe Tessitore on ESPN’s Heavy Hitting Boxing Podcast.
After stating that he lacked motivation, “The Latin Snake” went on to tell Tessitore, “Yet, I fear that he’s going to be stronger than me and hit harder than me. There are going to be moments in this fight when he’s actually going to connect and who knows how I’m going to react to these shots.”
So, Mora knew there were times where he would be tested. He knew Vera was a banger, and could dish out some punishment. And he knew Vera would be the crowd favorite, fighting in his hometown of Fort Worth, Texas. Yet even with all of this knowledge, Mora was still lacking 100% motivation.
Going into the Vera fight, Mora was fresh off a draw with future hall-of-famer Shane Mosley — a fight that headlined a PPV card.
Perhaps it was the lesser name, Vera, or the fact that this fight was on ESPN, not PPV, that Mora was unable to get fully motivated. Or maybe it was the massive drop in pay that Mora would receive from the Mosley to Vera fights. Or perhaps it was the fact that the tough Texan had just one win in his last five bouts.
Whatever his reasons may have been, I found Mora’s admission to be quite telling and extremely honest.
In my brief thirteen months covering the sweet science, I have interviewed countless fighters. In most instances, before a fight, myself or other media members will ask how training has been going. Never once have I heard that a fighter is lacking motivation.
In fact, the answer we get is usually the exact opposite. More times than not it’s, “This is one of the best training camps I’ve ever had…I’m hungry to go out and get the win…etc, etc.”
I expected to hear something similar from Mora, as well. So when he admitted that he wasn’t fully motivated, I wasn’t sure if his words were refreshing or red-flag raising.
During the course of the twelve minute interview, Mora also confirmed to Tessitore that he trained by himself for this fight, ditching trainer Dean Campos in favor of doing it the old-fashioned way.
So as I watched the first stanza unfold, I saw a Mora who was a bit surprised at how relentless Vera was. “The Latin Snake” wasn’t particularly elusive early on, and was a bit befuddled by Vera’s early early success.
As the fight progressed, it was really just more of the same. Constant, non-stop pressure from gritty hometown kid. Mora had his moments throughout the thirty minutes between the ropes — landing some nice combinations in the middle-rounds — but they were few and far between. He was consistently inconsistent throughout.
When the bout concluded, one judge scored the fight 96-94, Mora, while two saw it the other way, 96-94, Vera, awarding him a hard-earned split decision win.
In a sport where so much rides on any single fight, there never should be a lack of motivation. This wasn’t supposed to be an easy fight for Mora, and like he said, he had his fears entering the bout. Unfortunately for Mora, Vera turned Mora’s fears into a reality.
While credit must be given to Vera for pulling off what was arguably the biggest win of his career, a fully motivated Sergio Mora with Dean Campos in his corner, beats the best Brian Vera nine times out of ten.
While we don’t know how Mora will rebound after this loss, one thing we can bet on is that this was the last fight “The Latin Snake” would have struggled to find motivation.
Kyle Kinder can be reached at Twitter.com/KyleKinder or [email protected]
