Background and career
Victor Ortiz (born January 31, 1987) is an American professional boxer and film actor of Mexican descent. He held the WBC welterweight title in 2011, and was formerly rated as one of the world's top three active welterweights by a number of sporting news and boxing websites, including The Ring magazine, BoxRec, and ESPN. He was selected as the 2008 ESPN Prospect of the Year. Outside of boxing, Ortiz has had roles in the films The Expendables 3 (2014) and Southpaw (2015), and made a cameo appearance in the TV series Ray Donovan.
Ortiz was born and raised in Garden City, Kansas, and is the third of four children of Mexican parents. When he was seven years old, Ortiz's mother abandoned her family. Shortly thereafter, Ortiz began boxing at the insistence of his father, an alcoholic who often beat his children following his wife's departure. In an interview, Victor said, "I hated that lady. I drew her a card once with a little rose on it and I gave it to her. She just threw it down and said 'What do I want that shit for?' That's when I picked up boxing. Then my Dad started screwing up, drinking." Ortiz' father also abandoned the family five years after their mother left, which forced Ortiz and his five siblings into the Kansas foster care system. Ortiz was twelve years old at the time. His older sister became a legal adult in 2002 and moved to Denver, Colorado. Ortiz and his younger brother left Kansas and moved in with her.
While training at a Salvation Army Red Shield Community Center, he was noticed by former heavyweight boxing contender Ron Lyle, who had become a supervisor at the center. In 2003, Lyle guided Ortiz to a Junior Olympics tournament, where, at the age of sixteen, he won the 132-pound weight division with a perfect 5–0 record. This time, he was noticed by another former boxer, Roberto Garcia, who had held the IBF Super Featherweight Championship during the 1990s and whose father was the trainer of Fernando Vargas. One of Ortiz's notable early amateur fights was against Amir Khan, against whom he lost in a second-round stoppage.
Though Garcia was based in Oxnard, California, he offered to train Ortiz, who accepted and moved from Colorado to California, where he began training at La Colonia Youth Boxing Club. Garcia later became Ortiz's legal guardian, and Ortiz graduated from Pacifica High School. At age 16, Ortiz won the 2003 Police Athletic League national championships in Toledo, then at seventeen, Ortiz reached the United States Olympic boxing trials in the 132-pound weight class, where he was eliminated in the champion's bracket semifinals (The weight class was instead won by Vicente Escobedo). Ortiz turned professional later in 2004 while still only seventeen years of age. When he reached the age of eighteen in 2005 and became a legal adult, he gained custody of his younger brother, who is now a college student. Ortiz continues to reside in Ventura, California. Victor Ortiz boxed at The Garden City Boxing club, where he was trained by five trainers who all worked together to get him ahead in his boxing career. His original trainers included Ignacio "Buck" Avilia, Manuel Rios, Antonio Orozco Sr., Juan M. Aldana Jr. and Alfred Ritz. He won the Ringside National Title in 2001 and 2002 and the National Jr. Olympics in 2002.
After turning professional, Ortiz easily won his first seven fights against weak opposition. However, on June 3, 2005, Ortiz was controversially disqualified in the first round of a bout against unknown Corey Alarcon in Oxnard. After having already knocked Alarcon down once in the round, Ortiz knocked him down again shortly after referee David Denkin ordered the fighters to separate from a clinch. Alarcon stayed down for the count and was awarded the fight based on Denkin's judgment that Ortiz's knockout punch had been an illegal punch during a break. Following the fight with Alarcon, Ortiz continued to win and had built a record of 18–1–1 as of August 30, 2007, when he fought his first well-known opponent, Emmanuel Clottey of Ghana, in only his second bout scheduled for ten rounds. Ortiz defeated Clottey by technical knockout in the tenth and final round. Three months later, Ortiz followed up on his victory with another knockout win, this time in the first round of a ten-round bout against former junior welterweight titlist Carlos Maussa of Colombia. On September 13, 2008, Ortiz fought his first bout scheduled for twelve rounds, against Roberto David Arrieta of Argentina. Ortiz knocked Arrieta down in the second, fourth and fifth rounds and won by technical knockout in the fifth round. At the end of 2008, ESPN named Ortiz the boxing prospect of the year. On March 7, 2009, Ortiz fought his first bout televised on HBO Boxing After Dark against Mike Arnaoutis of Greece, who had fought top-ten light welterweight contenders such as Juan Urango, Ricardo Torres and Kendall Holt without ever having been knocked out. However, Ortiz scored a technical knockout of Arnaoutis in the second round.
On June 27, 2009, Ortiz faced Marcos Maidana (25–1–0) of Argentina in Los Angeles for the Interim WBA Light Welterweight title. Ortiz entered the fight with an eight-fight knockout streak. Maidana, a dangerous puncher, had won 24 of his 25 previous bouts by knockout. The only previous blemish on his record at that point was a close split decision loss to WBA Champion Andriy Kotelnik. Both Ortiz and Maidana were knocked down in the first round. Ortiz knocked Maidana to the canvas twice in the second round. Ortiz suffered a cut in the 5th round and was knocked down in the 6th round. The fight was stopped when the ringside physician would not let Ortiz continue to fight. Many in the boxing media, including HBO, chastised Ortiz for not wanting to continue in the fight, an issue which surfaced again later in his career after retiring in his fight against Josesito Lopez.
