LOS ANGELES – Katsuma Akitsugi showed up in America 11 years ago with nothing to say, nowhere to go and no immediate earning potential.
“I didn’t think it was that brave and I didn’t even think it’d be that hard,” Akitsugi said. “I thought, ‘It’s going to be OK,’ – kind of naive. I had no knowledge of what it would be like, and I think if you have knowledge sometimes, you have fear. You would think of it as a challenge.
“Not having that knowledge meant that I had no fear.”
Akitsugi was speaking of his decision to depart Japan in 2015 to train as a boxer in the U.S.
“I thought the U.S. was the main place to fight, that I just needed to show up,” said Akitsugi, who was raised in the Japanese town of Wakayama, a one-hour flight from Tokyo.
Upon his arrival in the U.S., Akitsugi enquired as to where to find a quality boxing gym, and a roommate pointed him to Hall of Fame trainer Freddie Roach’s Wild Card Boxing Club in Hollywood, California.
When Akitsugi walked in, he observed future Hall of Famer Miguel Cotto in training for his bout with Canelo Alvarez that year, and surmised this must be the place.
Akitsugi has been here since. He last visited Japan in 2018.
But he’s going back home this week as his promoter Garry Jonas of ProBoxTV has struck an agreement with Akihiko Honda of Teiken Promotions on a co-promoted card that will have Akitsugi 14-0 (4KOs) headline an April 11 Tokyo card versus Mexico’s Jose Miguel Calderon 14-3 (6KOs) in a bantamweight bout.
At 28, Akitsugi has progressed through those early travails to become a top-15 ranked contender by all four sanctioning bodies, at No. 5 in the IBF and No. 6 in the WBO, while in negotiations with WBA secondary champion Miguel Vargas that fell through.
Jonas explained, “Vargas turned him down, so [Mr.] Honda gave [Akitsugi] this fight.
“If he performs well, he will most likely get a championship opportunity sooner rather than later. If he doesn’t perform [well], then [Mr.] Honda [likely] won’t want him. So this fight is a huge opportunity for him to shine and get a fast track to a belt and being a star in Japan, which would be life-changing.”
A southpaw who trains at Wild Card under Eddie Hernandez, Akitsugi has fought four times in the past two years, most recently defeating recent bantamweight title challenger Vincent Astrolabio by seventh-round TKO in November and knocking out veteran Aston Palicte a year before that.
“This is the most important fight in my boxing career because it involves [Japan’s] Teiken Promotions and I have never fought in Japan, so everybody has been hyping it up because I am undefeated in America,” Akitsugi said.
“A lot of expectation, and I’m feeling a lot of pressure – the most pressure I have ever felt. I’m excited, but I like the pressure, to be honest. Before now, it’s like no one really expected me to win. I want to see how I perform under this pressure.
“I cannot [compose] myself. All my family and friends are coming, so I’m very excited to showcase myself in Japan. It means so much.”
The high stakes of the fight versus Calderon, 22, have inspired Akitsugi to prepare diligently.
“It’s going to be tough. He’s tall, he’s longer. He can box, come forward. He can do everything, but I can do everything too, so we’re going to see what I can prove,” Akitsugi said of his younger foe who recently lost a technical decision to Ricu Matsuda, who then defeated four-division champion Nonito Donaire.
Feeling he possesses more mental strength, Akitsugi says, “[Calderon’s] young, so I feel I can break him down, little by little.”
Rudy Hernandez, the trainer of former bantamweight champion Junto Nakatani, who will meet countryman and undisputed junior-featherweight champion Naoya Inoue at a sold-out Tokyo Dome May 2, said the character of the Japanese is unique. The drive, determination and discipline is next level.
Asked how meshing that with daily life in America has gone, Akitsugi said, “It’s normal for us to work hard for what we want. I didn’t think it was special. Work hard, be humble, be respectful.”
The toughest part of the transition was learning English, he said.
“Not knowing English at all, I could not talk. I had nothing to say. I didn’t understand what people were saying, couldn’t say what I wanted,” he said.
He went out of his way to converse with BoxingScene at a recent fight card in San Bernardino, California, and conducted the entire interview for this story in English.
He said he’s learned to lighten up from some of the frigid Japanese standards, and takes great comfort in U.S. life now.
“If you want to keep your Japanese mentality here, it’s not going to last long. You’ve got to adapt. This country is almost completely opposite,” Akitsugi said.
“I originally had a lot of stress over this country because it’s a different culture. People are different. Small things. I got very stressed and and annoyed when people wouldn’t show up on time, until I got to the point [of accepting,] ‘That’s just American people, it’s normal.’”
Now, as he retraces his steps and returns home, he was asked if the high stakes of the fight revealed in Jonas’ comments are unnerving.
“My goodness, that means a lot and that’s what I’ve been chasing these years. Now, it’s so close. I don’t want to think about what’s next. I want to focus on this fight, beating this guy. Step by step,” he said.
Akitsugi said he has no preconceived notion of what his countrymen think of him as he comes back.
“I’m going to show excitement. Whatever they expect of me, I want to prove to them I can exceed expectations,” he said.
And whether victory keeps him in Japan, sends him back to the U.S., or somewhere else abroad will be revealed in time.
“I don’t know. I don’t care. Being in Japan is good, but the ring is the same no matter where it is,” Akitsugi said. “It doesn’t matter to me.”
