By Chris Williams: #6 WBC Jayson Velez blew his chance at a title shot against WBC featherweight champion Daniel Ponce De Leon (44-4, 35 KO’s) recently when Velez injured his ankle.
Instead of that fight taking place after Velez’s ankle heals, World Boxing Council president Jose Sulaiman has reportedly moved former WBC super bantamweight champion Abner Mares (25-0-1, 13 KO’s) to the head of the pack become the official challenger for the 32-year-old Ponce De Leon.
Sulaiman said to Deportes Univision “It would be great to see a fight between De Leon and Abner. By regulation when a world champion gives up his title to move up in weight, he becomes mandatory challenger.”
I guess Velez is being passed over for his title shot. It’s kind of surprising because you’d think they’d at least wait until his ankle heals so that they could give him a shot, but it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen. Velez would have been a really tough fight for De Leon because of his youth and power. He’d make it tough for De Leon and might even have beaten him.
Both Mares and De Leon fight for Golden Boy Promotions, which makes this an easy fight to put together potentially. It’s definitely a bigger fight than the De Leon-Velez fight, and I guess a bigger sanctioning fee for the WBC goes with it.
Mares defeated bantamweight Anselmo Moreno by 12 round unanimous decision in his last fight in November. The fight was still competitive for most of the fight before Mares pulled away in the last four rounds.
Mares had been hoping recently to get a unification bout against WBO super bantamweight champion Nonito Donaire, but Donaire turned down a huge $3 million offer for the fight.
De Leon picked up the WBC title last September with a 9th round technical decision victory over Jhonny Gonzalez.
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