By Chris Williams: WBO super featherweight champion Vasyl Lomachenko (6-1, 4 KOs) weighed in successfully at 130 pounds on Friday for his fight former WBA World featherweight champion Nicholas “Axe Man” Walters (26-0-1, 21 KOs) on Saturday night at the Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas, Nevada. Walters weighed in at 129.5lbs.
Their fight will be televised on HBO World Championship Boxing on Saturday. Walters will likely rehydrate a great deal by the time he steps foot inside the ring on Saturday night. In his fight against Miguel Marriaga last year, Walters rehydrated to 145lbs. That’s quite a bit of weight for a fight that previously held the WBA featherweight title.
Walters failed to make weight for the Marriaga fight after coming in one pound over at 127lbs, which is why he’s moved up to super featherweight. In a recent photo of Walters before he started stripping down this week, he looked huge. It’s good news that Walters was able to make weight today, but he’s likely to put quite a bit of weight back on by the time he enters the ring on Saturday.
The Lomachenko vs. Walters fight is about a year late. The two were linked together last year in a big fight. The match didn’t happen in part because the money reportedly wasn’t there to keep them both happy. Walters wanted to be paid well to fight Lomachenko, because he felt that a fight of that magnitude should pay well. Walters is taking the fight on Saturday because it’s a big opportunity for him.
If Walters beats Lomachenko, he can capture his WBO super featherweight title, and win the prestige of having beaten him. It would open up the possibility for a rematch between Walters and Lomachenko if Arum is willing to take the risk of putting the Ukrainian back inside the ring with the Axe Man. Walters’ star appeal would soar if he beats Lomachenko. He can take the smaller money for this Saturday’s fight in order to make more money on the long run.
Being seen by the boxing fans as being Lomachenko would be a huge feather for Walters to put in his cap. Who knows? Arum might even give Walters a shot at fighting Manny Pacquiao in 2017. I doubt it, but it would be a great opportunity if Arum lets Walters have the chance.
Both fighters looked in great shape. The 5’7” Walters looked like the bigger guy with his one inch height advantage. Where Lomachenko is really going to have a tough time is in the reach department. Walters has a reach advantage of eight inches. Lomachenko has beaten taller guys than himself in the past in 5’8” Roman “Rocky” Martinez in his last fight, but he’s never dealt with anyone close to the kind of reach that Walters will have on Saturday.
Lomachenko’s promoter Bob Arum of Top Rank has high expectations for the former two-time Olympic gold medalist from Ukraine. Arum sees feels that Lomachenko is the best talent he’s seen since Muhammad Ali, and he’s talking about wanting to put him in with Manny Pacquiao in 2017. Arum really wants to make that fight. Walters, 30, is in the position to potentially wreck Arum’s plans of making that fight if he can beat Lomachenko. Arum might need to downsize his big dreams of Lomachenko if he’s derailed by Walters.
Lomachenko is good enough to still win other world titles if he loses to Walters. Arum would need to target some of the other super featherweight champions like Francisco Vargas, Jose Pedraza, Jason Sosa or Jezreel Corrales. It wouldn’t be a good idea for Arum to put Lomachenko back in with Walters if he loses to him, because it could be that Walters has his number. It would be terrible news for Lomachenko’s career if the boxing world sees him lose back to back fights to Walters.
Arum said this to ESPN.com about his high thoughts on Lomachenko:
“Vasyl Lomachenko is technically the best fighter that I have seen since the early Muhammad Ali,” Arum said. “There is nobody that I have seen, and there have been a lot of great technical fighters that I have seen — Alexis Arguello was one, Floyd Mayweather certainly, Manny Pacquiao — but there has been nobody with the skills that Vasyl Lomachenko has.”
Arum seems to be going a bit overboard in his praise about Lomachenko. He’s a good fighter, but Arum has some other very good fighters that are equally as talented starting with Nicholas Walters. Arum has Oscar Valdez in his Top Rank stable, and he’s someone that could be a champion for a long time. I wouldn’t be surprised if Walters and Valdez wind up having better pro careers than Lomachenko if they’re put in the right fights by Arum.
Of course, if Arum is going to put most of his energy in matching Lomachenko in all the big fights, then guys like Walters and Valdez may not get the big fights that they’re capable of winning. I’d like to see Walters fight Pacquiao. Even Oscar Valdez vs. Pacquiao would be an interesting fight.
Valdez is just behind Lomachenko. Valdez is capable of moving up in weight to lightweight to fight Pacquiao. I think that would be a more interesting fight than seeing Lomachenko fight Pacquiao, because Valdez would stand and trade with Pacquiao. Lomachenko would likely use a lot of movement against Pacquiao to keep from getting hit. Pacquiao might have to chase Lomachenko around the ring.
“I believe that if Vasyl Lomachenko is successful, he should be right up there for consideration for fighter of the year,” said Arum.
I don’t buy what Arum is saying about Lomachenko being ‘fighter of the year’ for 2016 if he beats Walters. It would depend on the outcome of the fight. If we see a controversial decision with the judges giving Lomachenko a decision that should have gone to Walters, then I definitely don’t see that as any kind of ‘Fighter of the year’ situation for him. Besides that, Lomachenko’s only other fight in 2016 came against Roman “Rocky” Martine earlier this year in June.
If you know anything about Roman Martinez, you’ll recognize that he came into the Lomachenko off the back of a terrible beat down against Orlando Salido in his previous fight. Martinez had fought Salido in back to back fights, and taken more punishment in those fights than I’d ever seen him take during his career. You can argue that Lomachenko got a depleted Martinez for his fight in June of this year. I could see Lomachenko as ‘Fighter of the Year’ for 2016 if he beat fresh fighters like Walters, Jason Sosa, and Jezreel Corrales. I can’t count Francisco Vargas, because he took a beating from Salido recently in getting a controversial draw against him. I don’t know what it is with Salido for the judges not to give him wins in fights that he clearly is the better man. Instead, we’re seeing Salido fighting to draws against Roman Martinez and Vargas.
“They call Walters the ‘Axe Man’ for a reason — he searches and destroys,” Arum said. “He is a tremendous puncher and he is in with a technician who has enormous talent in boxing not only defensively but offensively.”
If Walters chops Lomachenko down on Saturday, Arum is going to need to give his man his props for a job well done. Maybe then Arum can start pushing Walters for the big fights against Pacquiao and Oscar Valdez.
Other weights on the card:
Konstantin Ponomarev 148.5 vs. Silverio Ortiz 148.5
Trevor McCumby 172.25 vs. Donovan George 175
Fernando Carcamo 146.5 vs. Juan Ruiz 146.75
Maxim Dadashev 140.2 vs. Efrain Cruz 140.2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drL15S6U1xI