By Chris Williams: WBA/WBO super bantamweight champion Guillermo Rigondeaux (14-0, 9 KOs) will be making an uninteresting stay busy fight against little known Hisashi Amagasa (28-4-2, 19 KOs) on December 31st at the Bodymaker Colosseum, Osaka, Osaka, Japan.
The Rigondeaux-Amagasa fight will likely be about as competitive as Rigondeaux’s recent fight against Sod Kokietgym, who Rigondeaux stopped in the 1st round last July. Rigondeaux is currently stuck fighting the unknown guys like Amagasa because the top fighters in the super bantamweight division aren’t showing any interest in fighting him right now.
Rigondeaux is simply too good, and he’s finding himself in the same situation that middleweight Gennady Golovkin is presently in with none of the top fighters wanting to face him.
Rigondeaux is interested in facing WBC super bantamweight champion Leo Santa Cruz (20-0-1, 16 KOs) on January 17th on the Deontay Wilder vs. Bermane Stiverne card at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada. To be sure, it would be a quick turnaround for Rigondeaux to return to the ring after just two and half weeks since his fight against Amagasa, but Rigondeaux is willing to do that.
Now it’s up to Santa Cruz as to whether he’s willing to put his WBC title and his unbeaten record on the line against Rigondeaux. My guess is Santa Cruz won’t take that fight because of the risk of him getting clowned like Nonito Donaire was last year in his one-sided 12 round decision loss to Rigondeaux.
If Rigondeaux can’t get a fight against Santa Cruz, then he’ll be back in the ring in May of 2015, possibly against another Japanese challenger. The money must be good for Rigondeaux to be defending his titles in Japan over and over again. It would be nice though if Rigondeaux could get the top super bantamweight champions like Santa Cruz, Carl Frampton and Scott Quigg to fight him. Unfortunately the odds of that happening are slim and none.
They eventually may want to face Rigondeaux, but I think it might not happen until he’s aged to the point where he’s beatable and looking vulnerable. At 34, there’s no telling how many years Rigondeaux has left before he starts showing his age. It could be soon or could until he’s in his 40s. It would be a pity if Rigondeaux can’t get any of the champions to fight him even in his 40s. But in the meantime, Rigondeaux will stay busy defending his titles over and over again against the challengers.
Comments are closed.