Dan Rafael:
Well as you mentioned, this is the opportunity for both of these fighters, Maxi Hughes and George Kambosos to put themselves in a position to become the mandatory lightweight challenger for the organization of the IBF. Right now, obviously the undisputed champion is Devin Haney who has all four belts, but he is in the process of deciding “Am I going to stay at lightweight? Am I going to go to junior welter weight?” One thing you can be assured of is he’s not going to be fighting a third fight with George Kambosos no matter what happens. He’s in negotiations with Matchroom Boxing to do a fight at junior welter weight for Regis Prograis. There’s a very strong likelihood that the lightweight belts are going to be become vacant in the not-to- distant future, which means the winner of this fight is going to get the opportunity to fight somebody for what probably will be a vacant title. So it’s a significant and important fight for these two guys.
Kambosos obviously, in his last two fights he got toyed with, played with and completely taken apart and out-boxed in Australia, his home country by Devin Haney who traveled from the United States for the first fight, which was to unify all four belts where he won and became undisputed and then he went back to Australia for the rematch and spanked George Kambosos once again. So those are forgivable losses though because Devin Haney is one of the best fighters in the world. The fight before that, for George, was when he scored the big upset and defeated Teofimo Lopez to win the unified lightweight title and so he’s faced very good opposition and in Maxie Hughes, he’s taking on a guy who’s been on a hot streak. He’s won seven fights in a row, not against a lot of top names, but he does have the one big win that was a majority decision over the former featherweight title holder Kid Galahad, which was an upset and so he has been boxing very well.
He is an older fighter in his late 30s but he’s looked pretty sharp in recent fights and he’s a good boxer. Now neither one of these guys is blessed with a huge amount of power but they’re tenacious and they’ll go after each other a bit. So I think we got a pretty good fight on our hands. That’s the thing I always think about first and foremost. The question is who wins and how and even though George is coming off the two losses in a row and even though Maxi’s been on the hot streak, there’s no hometown crowd advantage. As you mentioned, this is one of those deals where you got a guy from Australia and a guy from England so of course they’re fighting in Oklahoma. So there’s no discernible advantage for either of the fighters where the fight’s taking place.
So all things being equal, George Kambosos has the two losses in a row and Maxi’s been on the hot streak but I think George is the better fighter. He’s fought better opposition over the course of his career and I like George to win the fight and get back on track. And I think based on the fact that neither guy is really known one as, in any way, shape or form, a puncher, certainly has not ever knocked out a top opponent, it feels like this has distance written all over it. As we talk about, anything can happen but I love this fight in terms of hitting the over which is 10 1/2. I think this fight goes 12 rounds and I have George Kambosos winning the decision put himself back in position to wait for a world title.
TJ Rives:
And I know you and I went over this second reference to our podcast, the Big Fight Weekend podcast. These are both, maybe not power guys, not huge power guys, but these are volume punchers and so this has a chance to be an entertaining fight because Kambosos will come forward some, will throw. Will Hughes comply and fire back? That’s the intrigue here. I’m going to side with you, I just can’t get past that Ferocious Kambosos, as he’s known, has gone against the better competition. He has a win over Teofimo Lopez. Yes, he got schooled really in both fights by Devin Haney but he’s been in there with better fighters. I think this is Kambosos by decision, I agree with you. So by extension, we also will double up as we lock it in on the over. So let’s put that down for both of these guys.
That is a Kambosos, as you see on the BetUS line -160 for it to go the route, 12 round fight, non-title fight but it’s an IBF eliminator, Dan and a 12 round fight. So the over on the 10 1/2 rounds and there it is at -550 again. It would be a bigger shock if Hughes can win anyway possible, much less win by a knockout here as the Englishman. Not very familiar with him in the US. We’ll see if he gives Kambosos a test. I want you to go back to one other thing because the deadline, the WBC wants, I guess, Devin Haney to decide “Are you fighting Shakur Stevenson like you referenced or are you going to move up and if you move up, would the belts become vacant for Kambosos to potentially have a title fight in his next bout late in this year?” Is that the theory if they’re stripping Devin Haney?
Dan Rafael:
First of all, it’s not a matter of stripping or vacating., Right now, it’s as they say, a fluid situation. Devon has four organizations that he holds belts in, so all of that’s being dealt with. It doesn’t happen overnight. The first shoe to drop was the WBC asking Devin Haney to give them a decision about which one he wanted to fight. Either try to make the mandatory against Shakur in the WBC in the lightweight division or become the mandatory and have Regis Prograis ordered to fight him in the junior welterweight division. But what people don’t understand is that that’s what the organization wants. The fighter’s the one that gets to make the decision.
Devin Haney can go and opt to try to go for another fight in another organization. He doesn’t have to answer to the WBC. As it turns out, that Friday deadline, as I posted on social media just right before we got on the show, the WBC at the request of those involved, has extended that Friday deadline to next Thursday because Eddie Hearn from Matchroom Boxing who was the promoter for Regis Prograis is trying to get a deal done for Regis to fight against Devin Haney and until he knows if they can do the fight, they need a little more time to do so. So the WBC complied and said “Fine, you have until next Thursday.”
So the direction that Haney apparently is going in at the moment, if they can get a deal done, is to go to 140 pounds and return to Matchroom boxing to do the fight with Regis Prograis. I have to assume if they make that deal that would be more than a one fight deal for Haney. I don’t think Eddie’s going to make that kind of agreement and just do a one-off and potentially get his guy beating Devon, suddenly a free agent again. So it’s a little bit more complicated than just making the one fight. But the bottom line, as it relates to this matchup between Kambosos and Hughes, whatever is the situation in the IBF, the winner is going to get the title shot. If it’s going to be against Haney or it’s going to be against somebody else for the vacant title, if it was Haney to stay, he’s just not going to fight George Kambosos again unless they offer him stupid money because what’s the purpose? He already beat the guy twice and did so easily. Zero public demand for that fight and zero money in that fight.
TJ Rives:
Clarify one thing for me. So Haney doesn’t necessarily have to vacate to do this, the WBC just wants a decision. Do you believe, from your reporting and what you’re hearing, Haney wants to compete at 140 long term or is this a one-off thing where he would fight at 140 and then maybe come back and fight at lightweight or you believe if he goes to 140, he stays there?
Dan Rafael:
If he goes to 140, he’s staying there. He’s struggled for years to make 35. It’s just a matter of time. Now if somebody came to him with some great opportunity and financial situation at 135, I’m sure he would stick around and do another fight. But if you’re Devin and you’re looking at the prospects of “What do I do?” He could fight Shakur at 135. I think that the money would probably be very good for that fight, but Shakur gets paid a lot also and so now you have to wait.
Which is the best deal in terms of my long term? Which promoter has other fights for me? What’s my feeling about those other opportunities? Again, every time there becomes a unified champion, especially at the magnitude of a undisputed champion, a lot of things are fluid. It’s like it’s a slow walk to get to the end point. The end result of this entire situation is going to be the following. All four lightweight title belts in the near future are going to become vacant and Devin Haney will probably fight somebody at 140 pounds and there’ll be a lot of jockeying for the vacant titles at 135, which is what makes this fight so important because the winner between Kambosos and Hughes is going to find himself in one of those positions for the IBF belt.
TJ Rives:
All right, well-summarized there. Again, that is the main event, top rank ESPN, Saturday night in Oklahoma. That’s fight number one on the handicapping. And again, a lot of people have joined us, Dan. That is good. Thank you for finding us. The live audience continues to grow. Hit the like button down below. You can help us out by subscribing, by sharing this show out. We’re here Fridays at 1:00 Eastern time. You see on our rundown that we will talk to you, the peeps, with questions and answers. We’ll answer some of your questions here at the end, after we handicap these three fights.
Now this is interesting. Errol Spence, Terence Crawford fight week next week, but before we get there off, of the weekend, and this happens some in Japan where they love to fight early in the week, a Monday, a Tuesday, something like that. That is the case for what is a tremendous fight this summer. American Stephen Fulton traveling over to Japan to defend two of his 122-pound super bantamweight world titles against the former undisputed bantam weight champion.
Just like Dan was describing with Haney, Naoya the Monster Inoue has vacated those 118 pound titles and moved up. This is a tremendous fight on paper, Inoue is favored. Dan, this is pretty close to a 50-50 fight on the money line. Inoue, 3 1/2 to 1. Meanwhile, Fulton from Philadelphia, 2 1/2 to 1 underdog. You see the prop bets there on knockout or decision on the screen. 12-round fight, over – under 10 1/2. Some handicapping on what is a really good Tuesday morning in the US, Tuesday night in Japan, dual belt showdown at 122 pounds with Steven Fulton going over to the far east to fight this one. Some handicapping please.
Dan Rafael:
Boy, this is one of the best fights you can make in boxing. As I have said, if you were asking boxing fans when the year started, “Hey, write down the five fights you’d like to see the most.” Guarantee you, pretty much everybody would write down Errol Spence against Terence Crawford and a whole bunch of those people would’ve written down Stephen Fulton Jr. against Naoya Inoue. It’s an A level, A plus level fight, as good as it gets. Two pound-for-pound guys, Inoue, many people would think is number one pound-for-pound, certainly among the top three at worst. He’s a special, special fighter. He’s already going to be in the Hall of Fame, no matter what happens against Fulton. He has won titles in three weight classes. He was the first undisputed bantam weight champion in literally 50 years. And if you go back 50 years ago, it was in the two belt era. He did it in the four belt era by knocking out Paul Butler at the end of last year.
And he said before the Butler fight, “I’m moving up to the next weight class to go after titles in that division.” So when he beat Butler a few weeks later, a couple days later, whatever it was, he, in January vacated the titles and is moving up to challenge Fulton. He didn’t just go up and wait to take on a regular guy to see how he feels at the weight or anything like that. He went right for the number one guy.
Steven Fulton has two of the belts. Marlon Tapales won the two other belts via upset not that long ago. But most people would say without question, Steven Fulton, based on his recent track record of wins over guys like Brandon Figueroa and Angelo Leo and Danny Roman, he is the best guy in that weight class right now at 122 pounds. And so this is one at bantam weight really versus number one at junior featherweight. And there’s a lot of history in boxing of that happening, whether it’s Wilfredo Gomez the great fighter, in those smaller weight classes that would go up four pounds, that was 122 up to 126. But I’m making the point that there’s a lot of history of guys who have been bantamweight champs who’ve then gone up to try to win titles at 122 or even 126. This is in that group of fights. This is a phenomenal matchup on paper.
TJ Rives:
Manny Pacquiao is another recent example of a guy moving up to 118, 122, 126, the natural progression. And again I realize he’s in Japan, but in a way he is a humongous star there. He’s come over and fought in the US a couple of times, three, four times. Fought in Las Vegas, fought in the bubble during the Covid craziness in 2020. But he is explosive, Dan, and this is eagerly anticipated here.
Dan Rafael:
He probably would’ve fought over here a little bit more, but part of that was pandemic related because Top Rank is his co-promoter. So the bubble was a way to get him some eyeballs in the United States. I actually saw him fight live in Los Angeles area several years ago, before he became a big star. This is back when he still held titles in the smaller weight class than he was in.
TJ Rives:
What was your first reaction when you saw him ringside? Did you… Dinner plates on the eyes? Holy cow.
Dan Rafael:
I had watched a lot of his videos. I had seen him before, so I was very, very familiar with him. So I was expecting a great performance and he showed that against, I believe it was an Antonio Nieves where he scored a knockout. We were highly excited and anticipating a great performance because he was a well-kept secret at that time. But the boxing dorks like me, we knew a lot about him. I’d watched the videos and talked to his people and was very familiar with him.
TJ Rives:
Let the record reflect Rafael referred to himself as a boxing dork. I didn’t call you that. The Savages didn’t call you that. You called it yourself that.
Dan Rafael:
Absolutely.
TJ Rives:
But in a way, a big star over there in Japan. So what kind of chance does Fulton have in this fight? What say you?
Dan Rafael:
Fulton’s got a really good chance because he is a superb fighter and he does a lot of things. He’s fearless, happy go lucky. No one forced him to go to Japan. He embraced this. His people at PBC, they were trying to make a rematch between him and Figueroa. That was a really close fight. It was a great matchup. They had an exciting action fight on Showtime and that was what the plan was. But he insisted “I want this fight,” and Inoue wanted the fight also. And obviously it was an opportunity for a career defining matchup, way more money than he can make against Figueroa in a rematch. And so he decided, “You know what? I’m going to go to Japan.” He was excited to go to Japan. I interviewed him on our podcast, as you know, and he talked about his excitement to go overseas and to take it all in and test himself against a future Hall of Famer.
Now one thing about Inoue, spectacular body puncher, probably the best body puncher in the entire sport. I mean he’ll cripple you with punches to the body and he can do so with both hands. But Stephen Fulton is a fearless kind of guy. He’s never been stopped. He’s undefeated also. And obviously the fact that Inoue way started his career in terms of, as a champion, in the 108 pound weight class and now he’s fighting up at 122 pounds. He may not necessarily be so much… If you look at them side by side, you may not say there’s that much difference, but Fulton is the bigger man from the standpoint that he is been in that weight class a much longer period of time and is used to taking punches from the bigger guys. Now I don’t know though if he’s ever taken a body punch the way that Inoue can deliver one or a headshot for that matter.
So to me a lot of this fight’s going to is going to rest upon how does he react when he gets hit with those punches, which I have heard from people that have fought Inoue that it’s a different kind of thing. I used to cover baseball back in the day, a lot of minor league baseball and you’d talk to the scouts and you could tell when there was a certain… They’d get a first round draft pick prospect and they’d throw a fastball or you’d get a hitter that would hit the ball. The pop in the catcher’s glove was just different than when you found from another class of pitcher. The sound of the ball off the bat from that special hitter, it just cracked differently off the bat. And Inoue’s punches, it’s sort of that same concept. It’s a different kind of feeling, a different kind of sound than it makes.
And there’s certain fighters where they’ve got that something special. Deontay Wilder has it in the heavyweight division with the way he lands his punches. Inoue is on that level, but in the smaller weight class. And so that’s a big road to hoe for Stephen Fulton. Now it’s not an unwinnable fight, it’s a matchup that’s very close on paper. I get it. And Inoue, he’s had big names on his record for those weight classes. He’s got the two wins over Nonito Donaire, future Hall of Famer. Knocked him out in the second round in the last fight, granted Donaire was older. They fought the 2019 fight of the year. The first time Inoue every really got touched up in a fight, had a broken orbit bone and a little bit of a bloody face and all. But look, one guy is a tremendous fighter. The other guy is a Hall of Fame fighter. Now maybe Steven Fulton will get there someday, but right now you got to prove that to me. And so I’m picking Naoya Inoue to win this fight and I’m picking him by a knockout and I’m picking him on the under.
TJ Rives:
Now we should mention to the audience, Rafael is not big on the unders and this is over/under 10 1/2.
Dan Rafael:
I hate it.
TJ Rives:
I know you hate it. You see my namesake, that’s not me, saying in the chat, “He likes this as a distance fight here.” I believe Inoue is going to win-
Dan Rafael:
I do too.
TJ Rives:
And he’s got dynamite in both fists, but I think Stephen Fulton is tough enough. He took the best punches of Brandon Figueroa and some others. I know Inoue on a different level, I think Fulton hangs in. I still go Inoue to win, but I’m going to go by decision. You could say that I’m chickening out on that. So I’m disagreeing with you on both. On the outcome, on the how and the when, W-H-E-N, I’m going to go, as we lock it in, with the decision. So Dan is on the KO for the Monster, Naoya Inoue-
Dan Rafael:
Listen-
TJ Rives:
I am going to go to Shimizu and I’ll get a little better value. Go ahead.
Dan Rafael:
I can see it either way. We’re on a betting show, they make us pick, so when you get down to it, you sort of… Am I in love with my pick?
TJ Rives:
Well, it’s interesting on that BetUS line that the knockout is -110. The belief is he is going to get to Fulton and we’ll see. And again, Fulton and Figueroa was a fight-of-the-year candidate that was fought at about a four to six foot square distance in the middle of the ropes of the ring. They just brawled for three minutes every round. So I’m curious to see how this comes off. And again, by extension, Dan going under 10 1/2 rounds, he believes under. In my case I believe it’s a decision, so I’m going to take the over in this instance.
We did have a fan asking a question, what was it? Purple, I didn’t see the back half of the name, Purple Something, was asking about what time will these fights happen? You always get these questions. Again, this is Saturday night in Japan. It’s early, I’m sorry, Tuesday night in Japan, early Tuesday for us. Purple Gancho. Purple Gancho wants to know what do we think for the main event Tuesday morning? What’s the ballpark here? Give or take on the under card?
Dan Rafael:
I’m looking at it right now because I wrote this in my notebook, which if you’re not subscribing to Fight Freaks Tonight, you’re doing yourself a disservice. I literally wrote that exact thing. I was writing a little bit about the under card fight, which we’re going to talk about in just a minute. So I’m looking at it right here. All right, so it’s a four fight stream for the US market. It’s four, it’s the two title fights and then they have two other Japanese fights that are also on the card. That is on ESPN Plus. It begins at 4:45 AM. This is times courtesy of Top Rank, which is involved with this event, 4:45 AM Eastern Time, Tuesday morning. So set your alarms early. If you don’t care about some of the early under card fights, the Robeisy Ramirez, Shimizu featherweight fight, which we’re going to handicap next. That is approximately 6:30 AM Eastern time and the main event between Fulton, Inoue approximately 8:00 AM Eastern time. These are approximate. So if you miss it because you counted on the exact time, that’s your fault. So plan accordingly.
TJ Rives:
And the under card fights could end earlier. Steven, I see you there. He says, “I got Fulton by KO here. A great little man loses to a good bigger man.” Interesting on that theory. So again, that’s Tuesday morning, yep…
Dan Rafael:
No, I was just going to say that’s the old… That is a saying, a cliche so to speak, in boxing. It’s certainly not in any way something that happens all the time. And when you’re talking about the special fighters, it doesn’t matter. Manny Pacquiao beat Antonio Margarito, a guy who came up from flyweight. Roy Jones who started his career at 154 pounds or 156 pounds, won a heavyweight title against John Ruiz. It’s a great small man against a really good, bigger man.
TJ Rives:
Oscar De La Hoya, by the way, who’s in the news a bunch, he’s got a documentary out. Started as a lightweight, lightweight, super lightweight, welterweight, moved on up to junior middleweight and even middleweight.
Dan Rafael:
He won titles in six different weight classes, which at the time was the record. Pacquiao did in eight weight classes. It’s something that often follows that sort of pathway, but it’s certainly, by no means, is it an automatic.
TJ Rives:
And we shall see here, this one again, sneaky good, adjust your time zone accordingly for Tuesday morning. It is streaming on ESPN Plus in the US. It’s later Tuesday in the day in the UK on Sky Sports. Again, it is primetime in Japan on pay-per-view for them on Tuesday night. For Fulton-
Dan Rafael:
Is it pay-per-view in Japan or is it on-
TJ Rives:
I’m not sure, you would know better than me, but he has fought on pay-per-view before. I would be surprised-
Dan Rafael:
[inaudible 00:24:20] streaming. Well, first of all, we don’t got to worry about what they’re watching in Japan, but the bottom line is my belief is it’s on Amazon Prime in Japan. [inaudible 00:24:27]
TJ Rives:
Okay, fair enough. Find a way to get to a screen and get to this. So to that end-
Dan Rafael:
One other thing about that fight, by the way, one of the reasons why I think that Fulton… Well first of all, I don’t think he’s going to be unnerved by being in Japan, but the one thing about Japanese fights, and I’ve watched a million Japanese fights. I love them when they have the big-
TJ Rives:
Self-professed boxing dork from earlier in the show is saying he’s watched a million Japanese fights. I like that.
Dan Rafael:
If you’re going to be in Vegas for a big fight or you’re in LA or in New York, you see the raucous crowds and they go crazy for their people, especially if it’s an ethnic fighter, a local rivalry or something, you’ll hear the fans screaming going absolutely nuts. Japan, it’s more like you’re going to the theater. It’s more like a play. The crowd is very like, oh we’ll clap nice and polite. It’s not a lot of raucous crowd. So there could be a great action fight, and you might hear the murmur of the crowd, but it’s not going to be them losing their mind. So from the Fulton standpoint, you’re not overwhelmed with the booing and the screaming for the other fighter. It doesn’t really distract the judges so much when they’re scoring rounds because everybody’s pretty chill when it comes to the action going on in the ring. That’s just the general nature and culture of the Japanese people.
TJ Rives:
To your point, go back and rewatch the Buster Douglas upset of Mike Tyson. Fantastic fight with a lot of action and Jim Lampley, your buddy, the legendary Hall of Fame broadcaster, says this upset right now is being met with eerie silence because they don’t cheer and roar even though it was a tremendous battle between Buster Douglas and Mike Tyson 30 years ago. So let’s see, even if there’s great action, there may not be a lot of crowd noise, a lot of rah rah.
Dan Rafael:
There’s a great line from Aaron Snowell who was the trainer of Mike Tyson for that fight, talking to the HBO cameras during the legendary Knights’ episode, the documentary that they did about Tyson versus Douglas and he spoke about the silence, the eeriness of the crowd. He basically said you could hear a mouse pee on a ball of cotton. That’s how quiet it was.
TJ Rives:
And yet the upset was happening right in front of him. So let’s see what kind of battle this one will be with Inoue and Fulton. We gave you a lot on that. Again, Q&A coming up in just a few minutes. We’re going to handicap one other title fight and this is the Cuban-born amateur star who is now a featherweight world champion in Robeisy Ramirez. He will fight on this card. A contender for his crown, Satoshi Shimizu. I got to confess, don’t really know anything about Shimizu. Now Ramirez has been good, a recent win over Isaac Dogboe for him. He is a featherweight world champ.
All right, so Dan, give me some quick handicapping with Ramirez, an overwhelming favorite. He is some 30 to 1 on the BetUS Line, no value there whatsoever. So it’s more about how does Ramirez win? When does he win? Et cetera. So what are your thoughts here?
Dan Rafael:
Ramirez is one of the great amateurs of all time. He’s a two-time Olympic gold medalist from Cuba. When he won his second gold medal in the final, he defeated… A close fight, but he definitely won the fight against Shakur Stevenson. That tells you the kind of talent he has, a tremendous, tremendous amateur fighter. Shimizu, his opponent is a two-time Olympian from Japan, but he’s older, he’s in his late 30s. He was an Olympian back in 2000, and was it 2008 and 2012? I’m not sure why he is only had about a dozen professional fights, but he’s like 37 years old right now. He does have the one loss, which was by knockout, but he’s getting this opportunity. But in Japan, he’s a famous guy because of being a two-time Olympic fighter. You mentioned about Ramirez, when he defeated Isaac Dogboe, that was for the vacant WBO featherweight title.
That was a big win for him. And the thing about Ramirez, he has overcome so much, not only in the incredible story that it took him to defect from Cuba to the United States, which has been well chronicled. It was just a wild way and in all the things he had to go through to get settled here. Soon after he settled and he turned pro, I think there was still a lot of stuff going on with his life and everything, in terms of all the chaos, in terms of getting settled in the United States.
In a shocker, huge shocker, he lost his professional debut. That is mind-boggling and for a lot of people, that was a hugely debilitating loss and people were down on him big time. But to his credit, he came back, he got himself back together, he changed his team, he’s now working, he changed trainers. He’s with the legendary Cuban trainer, Ishmael Salas who’s also the trainer for several other quality fighters.
Anyway, he got himself together. He hasn’t lost since and he frankly hasn’t really even been on the verge of losing since. And then he has that big win over Dogboe and he won the title and so he’s a hot fighter right now. He’s got confidence. He can punch. He’s a great boxer. He’s got speed. He’s really coming into his own as a pro. Sometimes with these fighters, especially Cubans, because of the way that they’re taught, it takes time to adjust from being an amateur to a pro. Robeisy Ramirez has finally, seems like over the last few fights, has made that adjustment to fighting in a more professional style than just a hit and run and just try to tap and score a point. It’s different in the professional ranks.
So he goes over there with a lot of confidence, excited, also similar to Stephen Fulton, about going to Japan to experience the culture and all that that goes along with it and defend his title. And in Shimizu, he’s got a name guy among the Japanese fan base. As I mentioned, two-time Olympian, not that much experience against the top guys as a professional, has a knockout loss. It just feels like this is they’re giving him this opportunity but they’re kind of feeding him to the wolf, at this later stage of his career, in terms of his age.
Hard pressed to pick against Robeisy Ramirez in this spot. Just a special kind of talent and I think he gets the job done. I know we don’t have an over/under on the fight. That line was not posted, but I picked him by a knockout. He didn’t stop Dogboe, but he stopped some other fighters in the past. He had a great knockout against Abraham Nova who was a good fighter. That was in the title eliminator, a couple of fights earlier. I think he gets the job done. I think he stopped Shimizu who the clock’s running out for.
TJ Rives:
Don’t get mad at me, but I’m in agreement here. I also like the knockout. We don’t have the official BetUS over/under. The belief would be, it would be something like 9 1/2 or 10 1/2 rounds. That’s typically what they are for these 12-round fights. I would not be surprised if Ramirez gets to him before the 10th round, before the 11th for sure, but before the 10th round. But we don’t have that line. So you and I are going to lock in on the KO prop for Robeisy Ramirez, the Cuban Star. This is immediately before the Fulton Inoue fight, early Tuesday, US time, early Tuesday morning. So we’re both on the knockout laying -120 on the BetUS line here for Ramirez to move on.
And quickly, give me a quick 30 second answer. What’s in his future, do you think, if he is able to get this victory as a unification fight, maybe on the horizon, and we start seeing bigger things out of Ramirez, late 2023, early 2024?
Dan Rafael:
It’s hard to say he can get a unification. Those are hard fights to make. I think he’ll win. If he wins this fight, he’ll come back to the United States. Top Rank will feature him probably in another fight before the end of this year. He’ll main event on ESPN or ESPN Plus and they’ll find a top contender. Obviously Top Rank also is the promoter for the IBF featherweight champion, which is Luis Alberto Lopez. He’s going to have a fight scheduled for September, so it won’t be him that’s next.
So I can’t sit here and tell you it’s going to be a unification fight, but they’ll do their job and they’ll match them up. They’ll try to build them up a little bit bigger. But I do think ultimately if Lopez continues to be successful and is going to stick around at featherweight and Ramirez is the same weight, that seems to be an inevitable fight because they’re both with the same promoter and they’re both fighting in the same weight class and they both have a world title. So that would be a fight that would be very interesting to make and I think maybe down the road it could happen, but I don’t think I see that coming up in the next fight, but he’s got to deal with Shimizu first.
TJ Rives:
All right, fair enough. And again, our live audience is growing and growing. A lot of you have just found us. We’re going to be here for a few more minutes with Q&A which we’re getting to right now off the Robeisy Ramirez discussion and Shimizu, the Japanese opponent. Let’s go to the question from Behold the Assyrian. I love the peeps and the savages with their handles. Behold the Assyrian asks a question about Robeisy Ramirez. He says, “Is Robeisy versus Mauricio Lara a realistic possibility at all?” I know there are different promotions. What do you think of that, just on the suggestion?
Dan Rafael:
Because of that, it’s probably unlikely, but you never know. Lara obviously had the loss and he’s with Match Room. I’m not sure what their plans are for him. It would be a perfectly interesting fight, obviously. He’s an exciting fighter and all that, but those types of matches are… Unless there was some huge amount of money there for it, which I don’t think there’s some pot of gold for him to fight Mauricio Lara as opposed to some other fighter that’s still with Top Rank, that there’s not a lot of, let’s call it political will, to even try to make the match. So there’s nothing wrong with the thought about would it be a good fight? Sure. I just don’t think that that’s happening. And the same would be said against any of the other fighters that would be in that same situation where it’s not some huge money fight.
Now maybe if Michael Colin, for example, were to come back and he’s coming off of a loss in a title fight, if he were to put together a couple of wins and Top Rank’s involved with him also, maybe he gets an opportunity at some point. So there are fights with name-ish guys out there. It’s just a matter of what’s going to be next and I just don’t think they’re planning that far ahead at the moment. They know in their mind, on their big board so to speak, that if he wins that they’ll have him slotted for some time near the end of the year, but they’ll take their time to figure out who it is. I would be really surprised it was Mauricio Lara, but if it was, I wouldn’t be opposed to that at all.
TJ Rives:
No, I wouldn’t object either. But how realistic? We don’t think so. Peter watching us. Thank you. Peter says, “Dan, who are your top three current pound-for-pound guys?” You get these questions all the time, quickly pound-for-pound for you. I’m curious myself, I don’t know this.
Dan Rafael:
Well, I mean I’d like to reserve that until after we see what happens between Errol Spence and Terrence Crawford because whoever wins that fight’s probably going to be number one on my list. But I mean at the moment you’re talking about Crawford, Spence and Inoue and those are the top three guys, it seems to me. And then you also could certainly see them competing for that top spot like Demitri.
TJ Rives:
Where does Canelo slot in? Does Canelo slot in there?
Dan Rafael:
Not in the top three. Listen, Canelo’s a great fighter. I’m a huge fan of Canelo’s, but given the loss to Bivol, is he top five, six? Yeah, he probably is, but he’s probably not quite top three at the moment. And Bivol is a huge talent also and had a huge last year where he was the fighter of the year and had the big win over Canelo Alvarez. Had the not quite as big, but still a very significant win over the undefeated Gilberto Zerto Ramirez, he’s a really talented fighter also. My thing about him is he just hasn’t fought since last year and he has nothing scheduled and nothing on tap.
But those fighters in no particular order, you’re talking about Bivol, Canelo, Spence, Crawford, Inoue, I think that’s a pretty good cross section of the guys that you would look at among those very elite fighters on the pound-for-pound list. But I’m sure that when the dust settles, after next week, because Inoue is fighting and Crawford and Spence are fighting. Check back on my newsletter the week after probably, well maybe even two weeks after because there’ll be so much in the aftermath. But you can count on sometime before the end of August of a new top 10 or even top 15 pound-for-pound list.
TJ Rives:
Let’s continue on the questions and again, those of you in the live audience fire a couple more questions. We’ll be here about four or five more minutes. IMPK13 says “Is Inoue the Monster hurting his legacy by continuing to fight in Japan?” Where again, he’s immensely popular, hasn’t fought a lot of big fights in the United States. What about that theory?
Dan Rafael:
That’s such an American-centric thing. Did Oscar De La Hoya hurt his legacy because he never fought anywhere outside of the United States? It’s just a preposterous notion. The guy’s the biggest star in a great boxing culture country with big tradition making eight figures for fights, an adoration of the public, a future hall of famer, arguably pound-for-pound number one. And as I mentioned, making huge money already with a huge amount of accomplishment. Has-
TJ Rives:
What about the argument? Let me interrupt-
Dan Rafael:
Has fought in the United States before multiple [inaudible 00:36:36] by the way-
TJ Rives:
He has but little, little-
Dan Rafael:
He’s never been here. He’s fighting your titled defenses in two different divisions, for crying out loud.
TJ Rives:
I understand. What about the argument that for the casual sports fan, they don’t really know who he is? Not the boxing fan that’s hardcore that knows who he is because he’s fighting in the middle of the night in Japan or early in the morning US time here, that he would be better served to have a fight or two in prime time in the US to build it up with the… I mean the American fan base is larger than almost any other fan base in the sport.
Dan Rafael:
He’s making eight figures in Japan. He can’t make that-
TJ Rives:
I understand that from a financial standpoint.
Dan Rafael:
So I reject the notion of the question entirely.
TJ Rives:
You dismiss the premise-
Dan Rafael:
Completely.
TJ Rives:
On a Friday. You have dismissed the premise-
Dan Rafael:
By the way, he’s shown a willingness to fight here. He has fought-
TJ Rives:
He has, he has fought.
Dan Rafael:
And he’s fighting the best fighters. He’s fought in multiple divisions, he’s won the fights and I don’t care about the casual fan. If you’re a boxing fan of any stripe, who know who Naoya Inoue is and you know what? Get up early and watch him on ESPN Plus. It’s not your right to have a fight in prime time in America. It’s a big world out there with a lot of stuff going on.
TJ Rives:
Rafael is spewing a little fire here. Steven watching us. Thank you Steven. He says, “Do you think Keyshawn Davis gets the KO tomorrow. This is the co-feature fight in Oklahoma on the ESPN Top Rank card. Keyshawn Davis, former US Olympian moving up the ranks at lightweight, what are the KO possibilities for him?
Dan Rafael:
He’s a great prospect. He was my 2022 prospect of the year. He’s the Olympic silver medal winner. He is a tremendous talent. He’s moving fast. He’s only going to be in his ninth professional fight. He’s fighting an experienced veteran fighter in Petera who was the former European champion. Whether he gets a knockout or not, you know what? I haven’t really given it a lot of thought. Keyshawn has gone the distance with some fighters. I don’t view him as a big puncher even though he’s had some knockouts. When he stepped up against what I thought was the best opponent of his young career, when he fought Juan Carlos Burgos, who has been a good contender but now a bit faded at this point. That went eight rounds. He seemed a little bored in that fight lane. He couldn’t get him out of there so he just put the rounds in the bank and cruised to that decision.
I think maybe you might see a similar situation on Saturday where he’s got the fight well in hand and the guy’s just not going anywhere and he is just going to be content to box him and win the fight. It is a 10 rounder, it’s his second 10 rounder. He is also had the 10 rounder against the… I forget the opponent’s name, but he had one other fight after that, that was a 10 rounder. This will be a second Schedule 10 in my recollection. So could he get the knockout? Sure. But I get the feeling that it probably does go the route, but you never know.
TJ Rives:
Plus 140 for the knockout for Keyshawn Davis on the BetUS line. B3, quickly, is watching and says “Who’s the front runner for Tank Davis’s next fight?” We left the air on the Bet US Live show last Friday and Tank got out of jail in Baltimore a couple of weeks early on the violation of home confinement charges. He was supposed to still be incarcerated until the end of the month of July. So he’s now out, presumably would be looking to fight later this year. A quick thought on that, give me a 30 second answer quickly.
Dan Rafael:
My belief has been ever since, even when he was incarcerated, that again that he’s coming off of a fight where he made $40 million or something like that against Ryan Garcia. So it’s not like there’s an urgency to get back in the ring in terms of the finances, but yeah, of course he’s going to want to fight again. He is going to have to get himself adjusted to, after having been in jail for the month and a half he was in there. I’m sure he is not in the perfect condition in terms of his weight or what he is been eating and all that. So once he goes through that process and they decide who’s he going to fight next, my strong suspicion, and I’ve said this before he even went to jail, is that a lot of it’s going to depend on what happens on Saturday on the Errol Spence, Terence Crawford under card, where in the co-feature you have Isaac Pitbull Cruz, the lightweight contender taking on Giovanni Cabrera.
If Isaac Pitbull Cruz comes through that fight, all is good. He wins, there’s no injuries. I think there’s a very strong possibility that the fight that he’ll return for at the end of this year will be a rematch with Isaac Cruz who gave him a very, very tough fight a few fights ago in a fight that a lot of people thought that Pitbull Cruz was the winner. And remember Pitbull Cruz took that fight on a little bit of a short notice because Rolly Romero was supposed to be the opponent, but he was involved that the charges were dropped, it wasn’t even a charge. He was being investigated by the police for a sexual assault incident that turned out that they dropped the investigation but he was put on ice while that was going on and they replaced him with Pitbull Cruz.
When the that was dropped, he then fought and defeated Rolly Romero by a knockout, but Pitbull Cruz on the shorter notice for that fight gave him a great match that night. A lot of people thought he won, like I said, and I do think if he wins on Saturday next week, I think there’s a really good chance we’ll see the rematch.
TJ Rives:
Good enough and we’ve got to get out of here in a moment. Thank you for all the questions here again, as we do this live on Fridays and Dan enjoys that as well. Let’s see what we’re on.
Handicapping best bets, this is why we’re here on BetUS TV. George Kambosos’ main event Saturday night in Oklahoma with England’s Maxi Hughes. Rafael and I both agree on the decision, 12-round fight and the over here.
Very intriguing Saturday, Unified 122-pound world title fight. Stephen Fulton of the US is-
Dan Rafael:
Tuesday, my brother, Tuesday.
TJ Rives:
Tuesday, I keep saying that. Tuesday morning US, Tuesday night in Japan. We get that straight. Naoya Inoue, Stephen Fulton, Fulton’s two titles on the line. We both agree the Monster, but we disagree on how. You like the knockout and the under. Pay attention, kids. Rafael not frequently on the under, but he’s on the under here in that one with a knockout for Naoya Inoue.
I think Fulton hangs in and we both like Robeisy Ramirez on the co-feature fight to defend his featherweight title by knockout against his Japanese opponent. With that, we have come to the end of another program. Again, we look forward to what’s going to happen Saturday and on Tuesday in Japan. Tuesday morning, US time, find a screen and that Fulton Inoue fight’s going to be fantastic. And guess what, Dan Rafael? We are allegedly together, all things being equal, next week in Las Vegas, Spence Crawford will be here and we will be there in Las Vegas on this live BetUS Show. I’m looking forward to that. Anything else in closing?
Dan Rafael:
I’m looking forward to it too.
TJ Rives:
Yeah, there is no doubt.
Dan Rafael:
The calm before the storm.
TJ Rives:
That is this week to get ready for next week and a tremendous fight stirring up echoes of Sugar Ray Leonard and Thomas Hitman Hearns, Oscar De La Hoya, Tito Trinidad, Floyd Mayweather, Manny Pacquiao. Here we go with Spence and Crawford.
Dan Rafael:
One thing, as great of a fight as Crawford and Spence is on paper. It’s a tremendous betting fight, just to put the plug in for our friends at BetUS TV because it’s a very close fight on the boxing odds. Spence being the slight underdog. You can see that fight going a lot of ways. Knockouts and decisions and close fight or whatever. It’s a really tremendous, tremendous matchup and all.
TJ Rives:
There’s a good tease. There’s a good tease. Be with us next Friday at 1:00 Eastern time for the BetUS Show, 10:00 Pacific for you and me out in the desert in Las Vegas, as we get ready for that one at the T-Mobile Arena. Again, as we wrap up here, thank you for finding us. Hit the like button and subscribe. Don’t forget if you’re watching us live the UFC Show with Maddy, Kyle and Lydia is up live on the channel two Eastern Time, right after we’re done. Standby for that as well. Brother Rafael, have a great weekend. Don’t forget to check out our sportsbook website. Thank you.
Dan Rafael:
Thank you sir.
TJ Rives:
Antonio, Francisco, Danny, everybody behind the scenes with BetUS, thank you. We thank you for watching the BetUS Boxing Show.
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