By Marcus Richardson: James DeGale had a rematch clause in his contract with Caleb Truax in their fight last Saturday at the Copper Box Arena in London, England. It’s important to know that DeGale (23-2-1, 14 KOs) had a rematch clause in the contract because he lost to the 34-year-old Truax (29-3-2, 18 Kos) by a 12 round unanimous decision.
Along with the loss, DeGale lost his IBF super middleweight title. DeGale wants a chance to win back his title. Without the rematch clause, DeGale might not have been able to get a second fight with Truax.
DeGale suffered a broken nose in the loss, says Warren. The injury is going to take some time to heal before he’s ready to get back in the ring in 2018.
“He’s got a broken nose,” said Frank Warren to secondsout.com about Degale from his loss to Truax. “I understand there’s a rematch clause in the contract. Richard Schaefer and Al Haymon advised me of that,” said Warren.
This is great news for DeGale. now he can focus on getting healthy, and making sure his nose and his surgically repaired right shoulder are ready for him to go in early 2018. DeGale said his shoulder gave him problems in the fight. He thinks he came back too soon for the Truax fight.
DeGale going to have to make sure he’s ready to go for the rematch, since he’s not going to get too many sympathetic boxing fans if he makes the mistake of coming back too soon once again. That’s DeGale’s fault that he chose to return to the ring before his shoulder was healthy.
Warren isn’t sure if DeGale will resume his boxing career or not. He’s not quite sure what the 31-year-old DeGale will do. Like the rest of us, Warren is going to take a wait and see approach on DeGale and whether he decides to come back. It’s difficult to imagine DeGale not wanting to avenge the loss to Truax. It’ll be a good payday, and it’ll give DeGale a chance to regain his IBF title.
If DeGale can win the belt back, then he’ll be able to face the winner of the World Boxing Super Series tournament in a unification fight next year. There’s good money to be made by DeGale if he can fight the likes of George Groves, Callum Smith or Chris Eubank Jr. The original plan for early 2018 was for DeGale to fight a unification match against WBC super middleweight champion David Benavidez. If DeGale would have won that fight, it would give him the IBF and WBC belts that he could use to get a bigger split of the revenue in a fight against the WBSS tournament winner. Those plans are going to need to be revamped by DeGale. He won’t be fighting Benavidez, so it’s just going to be a rematch with Truax, which is better than nothing.
“That was a tough fight for him,” said Warren in talking about DeGale’s loss to Truax. “He’s got a broken nose. That’s going to take a while to heal. James is going to need to have a serious think about what he wants to do in the future. He might turn around and say he doesn’t want to box again. Who knows? That’s going to be his choice,” said Warren.