Rigondeaux: Donaire is an embarrassment

By Boxing News - 01/12/2015 - Comments

rigondeaux111`By Chris Williams: WBA/WBO super bantamweight champion Guillermo Rigondeaux (15-0, 10 KOs) appears to still have issues with Nonito Donaire despite having beaten him by a lopsided decision two years ago in 2013.

With Donaire planning on moving back down to 122 after taking a licking from WBA featherweight champion Nicholas Walters in his last fight, there’s speculation that Donaire might be interested at some point in getting in the ring with Rigondeaux once again in order to try and avenge his loss to him.

Rigondeaux doesn’t seem to be too worried about it though, because he feels he gave Donaire a beating in their previous fight and he’s not impressed with him as a fighter. Rigondeaux sees Donaire as just some big guy who was matched against poor opposition when he fought at 122. In other words, Rigondeaux sees Donaire as a fighter that was matched softly and ended up with an inflated record.

“Who said Donaire was a fighter? Who? I want you guys to tell me who said Donaire was fighter? He’s an embarrassment,” Rigondeaux said via Thaboxingvoice. “That’s what happens when he gets thrown in with awful fighters. At 126 pounds, he gets busted by Walters. At 122 pounds he gets busted by El Chacal [Rigondeaux]. When I fought against Donaire at Radio City I weighed 125 pounds, how much did he weigh 142 pounds? How many divisions, not pounds, divisions, was he above me, and I still beat him.”

Donaire was certainly the bigger fighter when he got in the ring with Rigondeaux on that night in April 2013. The size didn’t help Donaire at all against the talented Cuban fighter, and Donaire ended up getting clowned by Rigondeaux for 12 long rounds.

It would be very surprising if Donaire’s promoter Bob Arum let him get back in the ring with Rigondeaux again. I can’t see Arum doing this. He would have all kinds of excuses for not matching Donaire up against Rigondeaux, starting with the comments that Arum previously made about the HBO executives not being too thrilled with Rigondeaux’s fighting style.

Arum can use that excuse again if anyone gives him grief for not putting Donaire back in with the Cuban fighter, and no one would be able to say much, even though Rigondeaux has become a much more offensively inclined fighter since his fight against Donaire. With the way Rigondeaux is fighting now, I wouldn’t be surprised if he knocked Donaire out if they fought a rematch.

Rigondeaux is coming off of a 11th round knockout win over featherweight Hisashi Amagasa last December in Japan. The 5’10 ½” Amagasa was a huge featherweight with the height of middleweight and long reach. It was tough on Rigondeaux to get near to the Japanese fighter without having to walk though shots to get in range. Even when Rigondeaux was boxing Amagasa instead of slugging, he still had to deal with the Japanese fighters’ long reach to get near enough to hit him.

Rigondeaux could be signing with Roc Nation Sports in the near future. He’s reportedly met with them recently. Whether he signs with them or not, Rigondeuax plans on staying at super bantamweight rather than moving up to the featherweight division. He’s a small super bantamweight who weighs 118 pounds, so it wouldn’t make sense for him to move up to featherweight to face guys that come into the ring in the 140s. This means that if Vasyl Lomachenko and Nicholas Walters want to face Rigondeaux, they’ll need to melt down from the 140s to get to the 122 pound weight limit for the fight. That’s not likely to happen because we’re talking 20 pounds of water weight that Walters and Lomachenko wold have to lose in order to face Rigondeaux. I don’t think they would be in good enough shape to fight after losing that much weight and putting it back on in just 24 hours.



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