Boxing Rankings: Prograis struggles, Tszyu romps, Teofimo retires, more

Rankings go up Mondays. We’ll as soon as once more have a two-week break, so no replace on July 3. It’ll even be a fairly lean replace on July 10, but it surely’s vital at 147.

Ranked fights the following two weeks:

• Welterweight: (5) Vergil Ortiz Jr vs (6) Eimantas Stanionis, July 8
• Welterweight: (3) Jaron Ennis vs (10) Roiman Villa, July 8
• Junior Featherweight: (3) Luis Nery vs Froilan Saludar, July 8
• Minimumweight: (1) Panya Pradabsri vs Norihito Tanaka, June 28
• Ladies’s P4P: (10) Savannah Marshall vs Franchon Crews-Dezurn, July 1

Upcoming Fights: (5) Zhilei Zhang vs (9) Joe Joyce, Sept. 2 … (2) Oleksandr Usyk vs Daniel Dubois, TBA

Upcoming Fights: TBA

Notes: I’m instituting a brand new rankings rule that should you miss weight simply terrible dangerous, simply horrendously, don’t even get remotely anyplace close to what you wanted, whether or not a battle went on or not, you lose your rankings spot within the division. Agency however honest, I feel, and approaching the heels of the Joshua Franco debacle this previous weekend.

Retroactively, meaning Gilberto “Zurdo” Ramirez is out for his own “not even close” issue in March, when a battle with Gabriel Rosado acquired canceled. Now pay attention, I might have modified my thoughts on this when Franco retired — which removes him anyway — however I’m sticking to it as a result of I feel it’s honest.

In at No. 10 is — my heavens — Michael Eifert, the light-punching German who fairly properly dominated Grandpa Jean Pascal in March. I don’t know that Eifert is all that nice or all that good, however he’s in a compulsory place and he did what was requested of him. The one loss he has on his document was a majority resolution towards a good fighter and he evened that rating by beating Tom Dzemski in a rematch, additionally by majority resolution.

I feel Ali Izmailov is likely to be higher, however Izmailov wasn’t precisely nice and was fairly simply annoyed in his ShoBox win over Charles Foster on June 9. Previous that, that is one other division badly in want of latest blood. Loads of hang-around veterans had been additionally potential selections: Mathieu Bauderlique, Don King Presents Ahmed Elbiali, Robin Krasniqi, Fanlong Meng, Igor Mikhalkin, and so forth. There are different guys like Joe Ward and Steven Nelson and Jerome Pampellone who simply don’t have a win like Eifert’s over even a really aged Pascal.

I strongly thought of Andre Dirrell, and reality be informed, I feel the Andre Dirrell we’ve seen in his final two fights would beat about half this checklist. However the query with Dirrell is how a lot he’s actually “again” vs how a lot he’s “often going to battle for a paycheck.”

However even when it’s short-lived, and even when it’s a case of a jumbled division with two clear prime canine and a bunch of chasers, hey, I feel Michael Eifert deserves it proper now.

Upcoming Fights: (2) Artur Beterbiev vs (3) Callum Smith, Aug. 19

Notes: I used to be watching Edgar Berlanga with intent on Saturday. I believed, pay attention, if he seems to be actually sharp, actually impresses, there’s an argument he might make for himself. However I didn’t see that. I thought he won fair and square, and took it with authority in spherical 12 (he didn’t really need this on the true playing cards), however I didn’t see a man I actually strongly imagine beats anybody on this checklist. He may beat a few of them — Mbilli continues to be considerably unproven, although he seems to be higher than Berlanga has, then there’s Akhmedov, Ryder, Gongora — however he additionally may beat none of them.

I actually do assume a Munguia vs Berlanga battle can be good, however Oscar De La Hoya seems totally determined to avoid this and take shots at Hearn. You ever see that 1937 film Useless Finish? There’s a brand new child within the NYC tenements and the native youth gang kick his ass over three cents, however then he needs to impress them and be their buddy. That’s De La Hoya making an attempt to hitch in on the Eddie bashing to impress 917-year-old Bob Arum and Al Haymon.

Upcoming Fights: (5) Christian Mbilli vs Demond Nicholson, Aug. 19 … (1) Canelo Alvarez vs Jermall Charlo, Sept. 16

Notes: Upon watching it later, I believed Carlos Adames’ stoppage of Julian Williams got here a bit early, however on the similar time I didn’t assume Williams seemed like he was gonna flip the tide in that battle, so I can’t be that pressured. A number of worse stoppages and scoring that truly takes one thing from somebody. This one simply can’t bug me.

For what it’s price — which I don’t assume is a ton — Adames is true there with Janibek Alimkhanuly for an argument as one of the best truly energetic middleweight on the planet in the mean time.

Upcoming Fights: (5) Erislandy Lara vs Danny Garcia, Aug. 5 … (4) Liam Smith vs (6) Chris Eubank Jr, TBA

Notes: No modifications. Tim Tszyu firmly established his spot at No. 2 together with his smashing of Carlos Ocampo, and Erickson Lubin sits tight at No. 6 with a win over Luis Arias.

Upcoming Fights: (8) Jesus Ramos vs Sergio Garcia, July 29

Notes: After a 12 months and alter of just about nothing however stagnation, the welterweight division is about to get scorching in July. Lastly. I’m additionally anticipating an actual attractive Ugas vs Thurman 2023 announcement before later!

Upcoming Fights: (5) Vergil Ortiz Jr vs (6) Eimantas Stanionis, July 8 … (3) Jaron Ennis vs (10) Roiman Villa, July 8 … (1) Errol Spence Jr vs (2) Terence Crawford, July 29

Notes: Effectively final trip, we talked about Teofimo Lopez, how he was again, how good he was towards Josh Taylor, after which he retired and vacated the WBO belt. I might select to not imagine his retirement — which I don’t, actually — however no matter. He says he’s achieved. We’ll respect that.

So out he goes! I’m additionally taking Josh Taylor out as a result of he’s made clear he’s achieved at 140 and there’s no purpose to go away him sitting right here, taking over a spot.

Then we had Regis Prograis with perhaps the worst efficiency I’ve ever seen from Regis Prograis. However pay attention, kinds make fights, and typically how that works is the opposite man simply makes one thing godawful to look at. I don’t assume Zorrilla had any argument for a win over Prograis, so it was extra only a disappointing efficiency, and I’m not budging Regis from the highest spot but. However together with his age, hey man, that could possibly be coming before later.

Would I’ve elevated Teofimo to No. 1 this week if he hadn’t retired? We’ll by no means know. I don’t imply that to be coy, I truthfully don’t know, as a result of by the point Prograis’ battle occurred, Teofimo was out. So I used to be by no means within the headspace to actually give it some thought the best way I might need.

In within the Nos. 9 and 10 spots are Arnold Barboza Jr, the blue collar working man’s contender who simply retains doing what he’s assigned and may actually get a shot at that now-vacant WBO belt lastly, and Rolando Romero, who I don’t assume is superb however will get Rolly privileges. (The WBA belt.)

Different choices thought of: Richardson Hitchins, who now gained’t be combating Montana Love on July 15; Stevie Spark, who beat Hitchins and had an argument to beat Gabriel Gollaz Valenzuela; GGV himself, as he did get that win formally; and Sergey Lipinets, who may have an enormous probability towards Subriel Matis in August.

Upcoming Fights: (8) Sandor Martin vs Arblin Kaba, July 15 … (4) Subriel Matias vs Sergey Lipinets, Aug. 26

Upcoming Fights: (5) Isaac Cruz vs Giovanni Cabrera, July 8 … (7) Frank Martin vs Artem Harutyunyan, July 15 … (6) George Kambosos Jr vs Maxi Hughes, July 22

Upcoming Fights: (3) Oscar Valdez vs (4) Emanuel Navarrete, Aug. 12

Upcoming Fights: (3) Robeisy Ramirez vs Satoshi Shimizu, July 25

Notes: Large win for Sam Goodman over Ra’eese Aleem, and I don’t assume Aleem loses a lot standing as soon as you actually have a look at the remainder of this division proper now.

Upcoming Fights: (3) Luis Nery vs Froilan Saludar, July 8 … (1) Stephen Fulton Jr vs Naoya Inoue, July 25 … (9) Liam Davies vs Jason Cunningham, July 29

Upcoming Fights: (1) Nonito Donaire vs (9) Alexandro Santiago, July 15 … (2) Emmanuel Rodriguez vs Melvin Lopez, TBA

Notes: Once more, Joshua Franco was going to exit the rankings both manner on the burden difficulty from final Friday. Then he misplaced to Kazuto Ioka, then he announced his retirement. We even have Jade Bornea shedding his spot after shedding to Fernando Martinez.

Ioka goes again as much as No. 2, an excellent win below robust circumstances. So we had two open spots right here. Andrew Moloney is again in; I do know he simply acquired dominated and scary KO’d by Junto Nakatani, however there are simply not a variety of clear choices, both. I went with younger David Cuellar at No. 10, what I’ve seen of him, I preferred.

However contemplate these two spots up for grabs, mainly. We additionally don’t know if Wangek (Srisaket) actually plans on combating on this division anymore. There’s nonetheless nice expertise right here, however the prime three guys are 33, 34, and 36, and so they’ve been via a variety of onerous fights, and all have come up in weight to get right here. Nakatani, at 25, is wanting like the long run. Martinez, at a “younger” 31, is a very good a part of the current. Tanaka, 28, can battle. However we might quickly lastly enter a interval of shallow depth at 115. Can’t complain a lot. It’s been an incredible division for a few years, and each division meets lean instances in some unspecified time in the future.

Upcoming Fights: TBA

Upcoming Fights: (9) Taku Kuwahara vs Wulan Tuolehazi, July 11 … (1) Sunny Edwards vs (2) Jesse Rodriguez, TBA

Upcoming Fights: (5) Sivenathi Nontshinga vs (10) Regie Suganob, TBA

Upcoming Fights: (1) Panya Pradabsri vs Norihito Tanaka, June 28

Upcoming Fights: (10) Savannah Marshall vs Franchon Crews-Dezurn, July 1 … (5) Alycia Baumgardner vs Christina Linardatou, July 15 … (4) Amanda Serrano vs Heather Hardy, Aug. 5