Allan Appel Photo
Super middleweight contender Elvin Ayala promised to be humble outside of the ring but an animal in it.
He was the centerpiece of a pumped up event heralding the resurgence of boxing contenders from New Haven that drew more than 100 fans and press to Leon’s Restaurant on Long Wharf Drive Tuesday afternoon.
The aim was to promote a night of fights Feb. 4 at Mohegan Sun Arena that features Ayala and four other young New Haven boxers.
Ayala’s manager, whom he’s pasting with a gentle upper-cut to the chin in the above photo, is Massimo Liguori (at microphone with Ayala and middleweight Greg McCoy)
Liguori said the Feb. 4 bout should position the 30-year-old Ayala, with a record of 20 wins, five losses, and nine knock outs, for a shot at the title. The promotional description of Ayala calls him “a ring-savvy veteran and a former world-title challenger who is willing to fight anyone at any given time.”
In his remarks, Ayala particularly thanked Luis Rosa, Sr., who trained him and believed in him. Ayala did that training at Rosa’s gym in Hamden, which Rosa has subsequently moved to Grand Avenue in Fair Haven. (Click here and here for stories on the old and new Rosa gyms.)
There the Boxing in Faith Gym, operated by Luis Rosa, Sr. (at right in photo) and his wife Marilyn (second from right), is the training facility for two other fighters on the undercard for the Feb. 4 event: bantamweight Luis Rosa, Jr (next to his mom in photo) and junior welterweight Edwin Soto (pictured far left).
Both are undefeated and like many in the crowded back room of Leon’s said they see Ayala as a local hero and role model.
About having the younger fighters on the ticket with him, Ayala said, “I feel honored. They were [once] little boys in the corner, doing their homework. Now they’re stepping into the ring,” he said.
The promoter of the event is Jimmy Burchfield of North Providence-based Classic Entertainment Sports. He said said he expects to have between 3,000 and 4,000 people at Mohegan Sun to see their local fighters.
Billed as “Block Party,” the idea of the Feb. 4 event, said Burchfield, is to develop a local fan base and then have those people follow the fighter up to Mohegan Sun and to other points in New England.
Ayala’s manager Liguori called the press event with the many local fighters debuting to the media for the first time “huge.”
He acknowldeged the change in the popularity of the sport: “Four or five years ago [at a fight night at Mohegan Sun] you could hear the echo.”
No longer.
“We now have prospects in New Haven [who could be] to be world champions,” he said
He added that in part the fighters are training better and are more focused on the need to really put on a performance at every venue.
“Back in the day fighters didn’t go to school. [Now] you got guys like Elvin who are smart, and assemble a team around them.”
Ayala graduated from Cross and trained when he was 17 years old at Ring One in the Hill, then with the Rosas at their first gym in Hamden.
But he has never trained as hard as he has since Liguori became his manager a year ago.
His current regime involves an hour and a half of personal training daily with his cousin Luis Pagan and then three sessions of boxing daily with trainers Mike Conroy and Keith McLaurin at American Martial Arts in East Haven.
“I once bought this body at Walmart, now I earned it,” Ayala joked with a winning smile.
He faces Mustafah Johnson, a veteran from Indianapolis with an 8 – 9‑1 record.
Ayala credited his tip-top conditioning as the new element in his game. “I don’t just see a move and think how to respond. I just instinctively respond,” he said.
His trainer Pagan concurred: “Thirty is a boxer’s prime, if he’s conditioned.”
Tickets are available either through CES or through Marilyn Rosa at the Boxing in Faith Gym (203 – 804-7537).
