By Norm Frauenheim –
Five days after one year turned into a new one and some resolutions were already turning into broken promises, boxing goes back to work.
2024’s first bell is Saturday with Virgil Ortiz Jr. against Frederick Lawson at Las Vegas’ Virgin Hotel in a DAZN-streamed junior-middleweight bout.
On paper, it’s an appropriate beginning, mostly because of Ortiz, a nice guy with a perfect record, yet plagued by health issues that have left questions about whether his immense promise can ever be achieved.
There was COVID. There was a blood disorder called rhabdomyolysis. There’s been a year-and-a-half layoff. But he’s also only 25-years-old. Then, there’s the unbeaten record – 19 stoppages in 19 fights, all at welterweight. The age and the numbers say the promise is still there. A definitive answer won’t be Saturday, not against the 34-year-old Lawson (33-3, 22 KOs), who is unknown, but comes from Ghana, a country known for Ike Quartey and Azumah Nelson.
But it’s a chance at renewal, a new beginning for Ortiz.
“I just want to prove I’m still here,’’ Ortiz said Thursday at a news conference.
So is the rest of boxing.
The theme continues on the second Saturday in 2024 with light -heavyweight Artur Beterbiev, who is 38, yet has Ortiz’ identical record – 19 stoppages in 19 fights.
Beterbiev is at an age when some suspect he’s at or near the end. He’ll be 39 on Jan. 21. That has to be part of Callum Smith’s thinking as he prepares to challenge Beterbiev in Quebec City in Canada, Beterbiev’s adopted home country.
For Beterbiev, the task is to prove he’s still here too. If he does, he sets up what could be a light-heavyweight classic, Beterbiev versus Dmitry Bivol.
A couple of weeks later on the fourth Saturday in January, boxing’s new year moves onto a key crossroads that could determine who belongs and who doesn’t in a bout that could set the stage for a May-to-September test of boxing’s viability. Jamie Mungia faces John Ryder in a super-middleweight bout at Footprint Center, the Suns NBA home in downtown Phoenix.
It’s a good fight and significant in terms of what it might mean for the game’s biggest earner, Canelo Alvarez. There’s been talk that Canelo might fight Mungia in May in the second of a three-fight deal with PBC (Premier Boxing Champions).
For Canelo, the decision probably rests in how Mungia looks. In a tune-up last May, Canelo won a decision at home in Guadalajara over the veteran Ryder. Mungia, hoping for a shot at Canelo, will probably try to do what Canelo didn’t. Knock out Ryder.
Whether that would secure a Cinco de Mayo date with Canelo is anybody’s guess. But it would put him in the argument alongside Benavidez, who’s been there for a couple of years.
The Jan. 27 bout’s location heightens the intrigue. Benavidez grew up a few miles from Footprint on Phoenix’s west-side streets. He first began boxing just a few blocks away from Footprint at Central, a gym known ever since Mike Tyson trained there in the late 1990s. Tyson is a Benavidez fan and friend. Because of Tyson, Benavidez changed his nickname, from The Red Bandana to Mexican Monster.
Benavidez, now a Seattle resident, continues to wear PHX prominently on the back of his trunks. It’s more than a baggage tag. It’s his identity.
He’ll be a big part of the Mungia-Ryder story. He’s already part of the neighborhood.
Boxing’s New Year begins with the Benavidez-Canelo at the top of the fan’s most-wanted list.
If it happens, it enhances boxing’s relevance. On Jan. 27, there’ll be answers as to whether it happens in May or September and in a way that would allow boxing to say:
It’s still here.
Bam-Sunny Postscript
VADA (Voluntary Anti-Doping Association) posted this week that both Sunny Edwards and Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez were clean for their entertaining Sept. 16 flyweight unification fight, won in a dramatic stoppage by Rodriguez at Desert Diamond Arena in Glendale, AZ.
Congratulations for successfully completing the testing, @VADA_Testing.org said.
It was unusual. Not exactly news. But it was also necessary, mostly because of Edwards’ unfounded allegations that Rodriguez was a user. It was trash talk, which ignited a social-media war — X-rated — between Edwards and sports nutritionist Victor Conte, SNAC founder.
Edwards is sidelined until at least spring of this year. He was suspended 120 days for a gruesome eye injury he sustained from Bam, whose answer to the trash talk was a beatdown. Bam doesn’t say much, but it looked as if some retribution was at the end of his punches.
