By Jim Dower: WBO junior middleweight champion Sadam ‘World Kid’ Ali (26-1, 14 KOs) weighed in at 153 pounds on Friday afternoon for his first defense of his WBO title against unbeaten #6 WBC Jaime Munguia (28-0, 24 KOs) in this Golden Boy promoted fight at the Turning Stone Resort & Casino, in Verona, New York.
(Photo credit: Ed Mulholland/HBO)
HBO World Championship Boxing will televise the card starting at 10:00 p.m. ET/7:00 p.m. PT.
Munguia, 21, weighed 152.75 lbs. Munguia looked at least three inches taller than the 5’9” Ali during the face off. Whether the extra height that Ali has going for him will help him on Saturday night remains to be seen.
Munguia has power, but he’s very young and completely inexperienced against world class level opposition. Unlike the 29-year-old Ali, Munguia didn’t doesn’t have the amateur background of having competed in the Olympics. Ali is someone that has been pegged for stardom since he turned pro in 2009. Unfortunately for Ali, it took him eight years before he realized his potential as a pro.
In contrast, Munguia is more of a raw prospect, who Golden Boy is hoping will someday blossom into a star. Munguia has a lot going against him right now in terms of his slow hand speed, his leaky defense, his youth and inexperience. Munguia is going from beating poor journeyman level opposition to facing one of the best fighters in the 154lb weight division. It’s fortunate or Munguia that he’s not fighting the likes of Jermell Charlo, Erislandy Lara or Jarrett Hurd, because it would be a complete mismatch.
Ali says he’d like to prove himself against the other world champions at 154 in Jermell Charlo and Jarrett Hurd. Ali’s promoters at Golden Boy will likely hold back his ambitions and have him defend against Kell Brook or Liam Smith next if he can get past Munguia. A fight against Brook would make Ali good money, and it would be more winnable than it would for him to face Charlo or Hurd, who are both looking very good right now. Ali isn’t a natural 154lb fighter, and that’s going to cause him problems if he gets inside the ring with Charlo and Hurd. Those two are more like middleweights than junior middleweights.
Munguia was one of the fighters that were on the running for a fight against IBF/IBO/WBA/WBC middleweight champuion Gennady Golovkin on May 5. The California Commission didn’t agree to sanction the Golovkin-Munguia fight, however, so GGG’s promoter Tom Loeffler picked Vanes Martirosyan instead as his opponent. Munguia would have been up against it facing Golovkin, and it’s hard to imagine him being able to make it more than 1 or 2 rounds before he was knocked out.
“It was a big challenge for me,” Sadam Ali said about his fight against Miguel Cotto. “I worked really hard. I stayed focused, I stayed smart in the ring, and I got the win. I think a lot of people underestimated me. They didn’t think it was possible. So I think I made a point in that fight and I still have a lot more to prove. Saturday is my first defense and I’m ready to go out and do what I got to do. They’re going to see power. They’re going to see speed, and they’re going to see a smart fight,” Ali said.
Sadam Ali pulled off a big upset last December in beating WBC 154lb champion Miguel Cotto by a 12 round unanimous decision by the scores 116-112, 115-113 and 115-113. Cotto was on his way to victory until suffering a left biceps injury in round 7. The injury slowed Cotto down, preventing him from getting his shots off in the last 5 rounds. Ali rallied at that point and came on to win a close 12 round unanimous decision. Cotto retired after the fight. If he wanted to, he could have returned and fought Ali, but he’d decided that he’d had enough after 16 years in the pro game.
WBC super bantamweight champion Rey Vargas (31-0, 22 KOs) weighed in at 120 lbs. for his voluntary title defense against #9 WBC Azat Hovhannisyan (14-2, 11 KOs). The 29-year-old Hovhannisyan weighed in at 121 lbs. He has an 8-fight winning streak going for him since losing to Walter Santibanes (8-2, 2 KOs) by a 6 round majority decision in November 2014. Hovhannisyan recently beat Ronny Rios by a 6th round knockout in his last fight on March 9. That was a good win for Hovhannisyan. He did a better job beating the 28-year-old Rios than Vargas did with his 12 round unanimous decision victory on August 8, 2017. Vargas should still prevail over Hovhannisyan as long as he’s able to box him from the outside,m and avoid getting hit too much. Vargas has recent wins over Oscar Negrete, Rios, Gavin McDonnell and Alexander Munoz.
Other weights on the card:
Kevin Rivers, Jr. 125.25 vs. Diuhl Olguin 124.75
George Rincon 140 vs. Corey Gulley 138.5
Luis Vargas vs. Damian Lewis 224.5
Lawrence Gabriel 198.5 vs. Brad Vargeson 194
Alex Vanasse 200.75 vs. Ray Santiago 233.5
