Quite a few fights have been booked over the past few days. We have two ESPN+ cards while Naoya Inoue, Victor Ortiz, Ryota Murata, Alberto Machado, and Miguel Berchelt will all also be in aciton.
- Not Good – First, ESPN+ has a sort of strange card lined up for September 28th. In the main event, Jose Uzcategui (27-2, 23 KOs) will be in action against Ezequiel Maderna (26-4, 16 KOs) of Argentina. His super middleweight belt will not be on the line in this tune up, however. That is a shit main event right there to be blunt. A non-title walkover and nothing more. Jerwin Ancajas (30-1-1, 20 KOs) will at least be defending his piece of the super flyweight crown on the undercard, but the fight itself isn’t much better regardless of its title status. Alejandro Barrios (16-2-4, 7 KOs) has never won a ten round fight and is coming off a draw. These are showcase fights on a Friday night and little more.
- Good! – Two nights later on Sunday, Victor Ortiz (32-6-3, 25 KO) returns in a potentially compelling action fight against John Molina Jr (30-7, 24 KO). Ortiz has finally been downgraded to FS1 by PBC, but it doesn’t really matter who is showing this fight. It is just plain going to be a good one no matter what the logos say on the screen. Both men have a dynamic offense and completely lack defense. Ortiz is by far the more dynamic athlete, but Molina has an excellent ability to deal with adversity while Victor has absolutely none whatsoever. I am looking forward to the fireworks here.
- WBSS2 – “The Monster” Naoya Inoue (16-0, 14 KOs) kicks off the World Boxing Super Series season two bantamweight tournament on October 7th against former titleholder Juan Carlos Payano (20-1, 9 KOs) on DAZN. Payano is a real good fighter. If Inoue is going to struggle at bantamweight, it’ll show here. Unlike most of the season one cards, this one will have a good co-feature to when light flyweight titleholder Ken Shiro (13-0, 7 KOs) defends against recent titleholder Milan Melindo (37-3, 13 KO). That’s a well matched fight. Shiro is arguably the top guy in the division and Melindo only has the former tag because he very narrowly lost a unification fight.
- Happy Ending – Ryota Murata (14-1, 11 KOs) will not be vacating his secondary WBA middleweight belt. This has been expected since he and his promoters declined to participate in the purse bid for his mandated defense against American fringe contender Rob Brant (23-1, 16 KOs) due to displeasure with the purse split, but the two sides resolved their issues and the fight is on. October 20th will play host in Vegas on ESPN+.
- Machado Defense – The October 27th middleweight title showdown between Danny Jacobs and Sergiy Derevyanchenko on HBO now has its co-main event in the form of Puerto Rican junior lightweight titleholder Alberto Machado’s (20-0, 16 KOs) second defense. He will meet once thought to be busted prospect Yuandale Evans (20-1, 14 KOs). Evans was a top US amateur, but a 2012 one round knockout loss to then unbeaten fellow prospect Javier Fortuna had him out of the ring for over three years. The Cleveland native is 4-0 since his hiatus, however, and is getting the opportunity he needs here. Machado could struggle with an athletic mover like Evans too.
- Berchelt Back – Finally, November 3rd finally brings Miguel Berchelt (34-1, 30 KO) back to competition against the top of the junior lightweight division when he does battle with all-action Miguel “Mickey” Roman (60-12, 47 KO) on ESPN+. In truth I don’t think Berchelt is going to struggle here all that much more than he did against Barros or Awuku given the style matchup and talent disparity, but Roman will certainly give it his all in there. That’s all he can do and all we can really ask of him. Mickey is 4-0 since losing his last title shot in a fight of the year candidate against Takashi Miura including a win over Orlando Salido.
