Two of the highest girls in MMA’s lighter divisions are set to satisfy in
a champ vs. champ superfight with pound-for-pound implications.
Deep
Jewels atomweight champ Si Yoon
Park (6-3) will defend her title towards her strawweight
counterpart, Seika Izawa
(12-0), at Deep Jewels 44 on March 24 in Tokyo. The promotion
made the announcement on Jan. 23, simply days after “Sankaru” added
the Black Combat atomweight title to her {hardware}
assortment by defeating Moeri Suda
at Black Fight 10.
Within the challenger, Park will face a fellow multi-divisional
champion, as Izawa owns the
Rizin Fighting Federation tremendous atomweight (108 lbs.) belt in
addition to her Jewels title. A win by Izawa would make her a
simultaneous three-division champion, a feat practically unprecedented
in top-level MMA.
Then again, a profitable protection by Park would reaffirm her
standing as one of many world’s high atomweights and proceed her
surprising rise over the past 12 months. Park, who went 1-3 in her first
4 skilled bouts from 2017 to 2019, returned final March from
a three-year layoff and has since received 5 straight fights, three
through stoppage, to seize her Jewels and Black Fight titles.
Izawa isn’t any stranger to fast profession ascent herself. In simply her
third profession struggle, the then 23-year-old received the Jewels strawweight
title by defeating Miki
Motono. Seven months later, she pounded out Rizin tremendous
atomweight champ and longtime pound-for-pound stalwart Ayaka
Hamasaki in a non-title struggle, then repeated the feat at Rizin
35 in April of 2022 to take the belt.
Deep Jewels 44 takes place on March 24 at New Pier Corridor in Tokyo,
Japan, with 10 women’s bouts currently confirmed. In
addition to the Park vs. Izawa primary occasion, the primary card is stacked
with three tremendous atomweight bouts: Street FC champion Jeong Eun
Park (9-7-1) takes on Namiko
Kawabata (4-3) within the co-main occasion, with Yuko Kiryu
(13-10) vs. Kate Oyama
(4-6) and Mizuki
Furuse (11-11) and Saki
Kitamura (1-2) forward of them.
