SINCE HE WAS 5 YEARS OLD, RAFAEL RUELAS HAS ASSUMED THE RESPONSIBILITIES OF. . . . : A Family Man : Life Has Been a Daily Struggle, in Both Jalisco and L.A., but He Doesn’t Figure to Change--Even for $1 Million : THE COUNT: 5 DAYS. . .to the showdown: De La Hoya vs. Ruelas

If Rafael Ruelas is nervous about his Saturday night ring date with Oscar De La Hoya in Las Vegas, it does not show.

Ruelas is almost Zen-like when it comes to his emotions.

He is only two years older than De La Hoya, the 22-year-old “Golden Boy,” yet it is hard to imagine Ruelas ever having been anything but a man.

“I was making good money at 11 years old,” Ruelas says matter-of-factly.

When he was 5, Rafael and 6-year-old brother Gabriel would be sent off alone in bare feet to tend cattle in the mountains near their family’s ranch in Yerba Buena, Mexico.

“We never lived like kids,” Gabriel remembers. “We were men so fast.”

What Rafael might give away to De La Hoya in natural ability and punching power he believes can be recouped in resolve, maturity and life experience.

In February 1994 at the Forum, Ruelas won the International Boxing Federation lightweight title from Freddie Pendleton after being knocked down twice in the first round.

Getting up off the ground is a Ruelas family tradition.

Joe Goossen, Rafael’s trainer, looks into his fighter’s button-brown eyes and sees more than a champion.

“When I look in Rafael’s eyes, I see the ranch,” Goossen says.

Three years ago, Goossen toured the remote village in the province of Jalisco where the Ruelas brothers were born. He came to understand how boys could be hardened so fast.

“There’s no room for a lack of discipline,” Goossen says. “It’s a daily struggle for survival there. They wouldn’t say struggle . It’s the lifestyle they’ve had for a thousand years. One day runs into the next. There’s no distinction between Monday and Friday.

“If you want dinner, you have to collect it. If you want meat, you have to kill it. If you want water, it has to be tapped. If you want corn, you have to ride to the field and pick it.”

In 1979, at 7 and 8, Rafael and Gabriel were sneaked across the border to live with an older sister in Sylmar. They would not reunite with their parents for years.

Rafael, in essence, assumed the role of patriarch. While Gabriel took advantage of his new freedom--sloughing off at school and causing the usual childhood mayhem--Rafael never let go of Jalisco.

Life was a daily struggle, even in America.

It was Rafael who first saw the posted flyer promising the chance to “earn $75 a week or more” selling candy.

It was Rafael who recruited a disinterested Gabriel into the candy business.

Once, in Santa Barbara, the Ruelas boys were stopped by police because they didn’t have a license to sell candy in the city.

“They asked us how much money we made,” Gabriel recalls. “I said I made about $80 a week. Then they asked Rafael. He said he made $500. They said, ‘How could you be making so much money?’

“Rafael said, ‘I sell a lot of candy.’ ”

Before he was old enough to drive, Rafael was using his earnings to help pay rent.

It was Rafael who graduated from North Hollywood High in three years, recalling, “I felt an urgency to start making money.”

It was Rafael who worried about family finances, Rafael who did the paperwork to secure green cards for Gabriel and other family members.

It was Rafael who took a summer job in high school with the law firm of Caprio and Freixes, processing amnesty applications and translating birth certificates from Spanish to English.

Rafael even had business cards made, on which he also had printed: “Repairs TVs and VCRs.”

At 16, Rafael had a key to the law firm’s office. When he quit to pursue his boxing career, the lawyers took him to lunch and begged him to reconsider.

Gabriel says: “I didn’t graduate. I was always in fights. I was always looking for fights. Him, at lunch, he was in the library.”

Gabe figured to end up the boxer, Rafael the lawyer.

Gabe wanted his brother to do battle at Harvard, not Caesars.

“I told him, ‘Rafael, you stay in school. I’ll fight and give you money,’ ” Gabe says. “I said, ‘Don’t box, you’re too skinny.’ But it pushed him harder to prove us wrong.”

Not that it was ever easy.

“I’d go to the park and run, and people would think I was crazy, because I certainly didn’t need to lose weight,” Rafael remembers. “In high school, I felt so much (peer) pressure. Everyone’s playing, and I’m running laps. That kept me from doing it at first. Once I got older, I said ‘I’m going to do this right.’ ”

Since coming to America, Rafael confesses that alcohol has passed his lips.

Two beers. Total.

Oh, and one time someone slipped some Kahlua into his coffee.

Nothing much has changed since the Ruelas brothers became world champions. Rafael has saved most of his prize money and invested wisely.

Gabe, the World Boxing Council junior-lightweight champion, does not balance his checkbook.

“I just write checks and see how much I have left,” Gabe says.

Rafael purchased a five-bedroom house in Sylmar and lives there with his parents and two siblings.

Gabriel found a beautiful woman and made her his wife.

“Sometimes I do wish he was like me so he could enjoy what he has,” Gabe says of his brother.

It is still Rafael, expected to earn more than $1 million for his fight, who frets over family matters.

“That’s the way he is,” Gabe says. “I’m glad he lives with my parents, because whenever something goes wrong, people sending the wrong bills, he’ll take care of that stuff. Like any family man would do. The husband.”

Rafael says now that his parents are comfortable and set, he will begin a search for his own home after the De La Hoya fight.

Gabe, who never met a gold chain he didn’t like, wishes his brother would loosen up.

“One time, he wanted to buy a watch,” Gabe says. “It took him a year to buy it! I called him many names. We went to Hong Kong. I said, ‘Why don’t you buy it here?’ When you talk a hundred dollars, more or less, I don’t care. But we went to many stores. One day, he called me, there was a store next to my place. He said ‘Gabe, do you want to go and see a watch?’ I said, ‘Rafael, if you tell me that you’re going to buy it, I’ll go with you.

“We’d go into stores, and I’d tell the (salesman), ‘Ask him if he’s going to buy it, otherwise we’re going to spend an hour here and he won’t buy anything.’ ”

The burden of responsibility has taken its toll on Rafael. A few years ago, he suffered excruciating stomach pains and had trouble keeping food down. He sought medical relief, but balked when a doctor suggested he take anti-depressants.

Rafael refused and worked out the problems himself.

It is not a period of his life he wishes to discuss.

Since then, he has found slices of happiness. In December 1993, he met a girl named Michelle. She worked at a pharmacy near his home.

After cat-and-mousing into a relationship, they are now boyfriend and girlfriend.

This was the kind of fun Gabriel had in mind for his brother.

Gabe has only one other request.

“Rafael,” he says. “Why don’t you spend some money?”

*

It is 4 p.m. on a Tuesday at Larry Goossen’s gym in Big Bear, and Rafael Ruelas has busted up another sparring partner. In this camp, Ruelas has gone through partners like peanuts.

Speaking in Spanish, the shaken boy’s father complains there was something wrong with his son’s gloves.

“It ain’t the gloves,” Joe Goossen barks back from ringside.

The boy wobbles away.

Rafael does not mean to hurt people.

He is, in fact, a pacifist and bookworm. Away from the gym, as his brother watches sitcoms or cartoons, Rafael holes up in his room reading. He loves biographies and the inspirational writings of Norman Vincent Peale and C.S. Lewis.

The ring to Ruelas is not an arena of rage and retribution. It is, oddly, where he is most at peace.

“It’s funny, when I’m in there, I think about patience, not losing control, not getting angry,” he explains. “I think about maintaining control, not getting emotional, not going out like an animal.

“I think of just trying to do my job, and I try to do it peacefully. If I get hit with a great shot, I don’t think, ‘I’ve got to get this guy.’ No, I just try to get it back.

“When I hit someone with a good shot, it’s a great feeling, not like I hurt somebody, not a malicious feeling at all. It’s just a great feeling that I accomplished what I wanted to do.

“A lot of times I see a faceless opponent, just as capable as me.”

He is one of the few fighters who does not participate in prefight hype or name-calling. De La Hoya has lobbed a few salvos, hoping perhaps to get under Ruelas’ skin, but has thus far been unable to strike his intended target.

De La Hoya used to say a fight against Ruelas would be his easiest to date. He has also referred to Rafael at times, condescendingly, as a “good little fighter.”

Ruelas won’t bite.

“I just laugh.” Ruelas says. “It’s so fake. I know it’s so fake. I know him. I sparred with him. I fought him.”

In a psychological war, Ruelas may have the upper hand.

Ruelas has reasons to lash back. Though he is the more established champion, one who has fought 27 more professional bouts than his opponent, Ruelas is making less money than De La Hoya for this fight.

“I don’t have any resentment,” Ruelas says. “I’m very peaceful. I go about my own life, work hard, sacrifice. There are always going to be people who maybe are working less and gaining or getting a lot more. Yeah, some people get those kinds of breaks. That’s what the gold medal did for (De La Hoya). But now we’re colliding. He’s facing me. This is where I come in, stand my ground, beat him.

“And then it’s me.”

Ruelas also is smart enough to know that a rising tide lifts all lightweights, that he could never have secured his $1-million purse if not for the drawing power of De La Hoya. “Oh definitely,” Ruelas says. “I’m glad he’s a lightweight. If he hadn’t won the gold medal, there’s no story.”

As the days dwindle to a precious few before the most anticipated area fight in more than 20 years, Ruelas tries to block from his mind the fight’s local magnitude.

That will become increasingly difficult once he and Gabe, who is fighting on the undercard, arrive in Las Vegas on Tuesday.

But don’t expect Rafael Ruelas to bring extra anti-perspirant.

“I don’t get overanxious,” he says. “I just have to be patient, let time go by, try to maintain. I have a lot of faith and confidence. I’ve done my homework. I’m ready for it. It’s not like I’m not there yet and I’m in a rush to get there.”

And if he wins?

“It will be a surprise to a lot of people, but it won’t be a surprise to me.”