Andy Ruiz Jr. ‘BIG announcement coming soon’

By Boxing News - 03/02/2020 - Comments

By Dan Ambrose: Andy Ruiz Jr. is saying he’s got a huge announcement to make soon to his fans involving his career. Ruiz Jr. will be disappointing his fans if his “big announcement” is a fight between him and an over-matched C-level fighter. If it’s lower-level opponent, then Ruiz shouldn’t be getting his fans’ hopes up.

Three weeks ago, Ruiz posted a similar message about “big news coming soon,” and then nothing.

He said recently that he was planning in fighting in August in a tune-up bout before possibly facing Luis Ortiz. Ruiz’s tune-up opponent could be 38-year-old Chris Arreola.

Ruiz (33-2, 22 KOs) is coming off of a 12 round unanimous decision loss to Anthony Joshua on December 7. Andy didn’t look so good in that fight in terms of his weight, which was 283 lbs, and how he performed in losing by a lopsided decision. Ruiz lost on the scorecards against AJ by the scores 118-110, 119-109 and 118-110.

Fans would be pleased if Ruiz forgot about a tune-up and went after 41-year-old Ortiz or perhaps Dillian Whyte. Ruiz far enough advanced into his 11-year pro career to where he doesn’t need warm-up fights. He needs to lose weight, but not a lot.

Compared to Tyson Fury, Ruiz only needs to drop a small amount to get down to the mid-250s. That’s only 30 lbs and it shouldn’t be a problem for Ruiz as long as he stays away from rich foods and alcohol. Fury was close to 400 lbs when he began his comeback in 2018.

Ruiz said this on social media several weeks ago:

“Got the news from my manager on my next opponent. Guess who I’m fighting next below πŸ†. 2w”

“Can’t wait to announce my next opponent, big news coming soon πŸ†. 3w”

British heavyweight Dillian Whyte revealed recently that his promoter made two offers to Ruiz for a fight between them. Whyte says that one of the offers made to Ruiz was for the same amount of money he made in his first fight against Joshua year. Ruiz made $5 million for that fight, and he pulled off a big upset in stopping him in the 7th round in June 2019.

For Ruiz to be turning down $5 million for a fight with Whyte, it gives the impression that he won’t be taking any risky fights until he gets a trilogy match with Joshua or a title shot against Tyson Fury.

Joshua and his promoter Eddie Hearn both said that Ruiz needs to rebuild himself first by beating a couple of good heavyweights before they’ll consider him as an option for a third contest. Hearn and Joshua didn’t say who Ruiz needs to beat for him to get a third fight, but it’s likely someone like Whyte.

Ruiz needs to beat these type of heavyweights to be taken seriously by AJ:

  • Dillian Whyte
  • Adam Kownacki
  • Luis Ortiz
  • Oleksandr Usyk
  • Joseph Parker

The Ruiz Jr. that defeated Joshua last year would have a chance of beating most of those fighters, but he probably won’t beat them all.

The money that Ruiz Jr. has made in his two fights with Joshua seems to have distracted. He’s buying a lot of cars, and he’s all of a sudden able to purchase things that were previously out of his price range. It’s got to be difficult for Ruiz to focus on his training when he’s so busy enjoying his new wealth, and his fame.

Even though Ruiz Jr. lost a one-sided decision to AJ in their rematch last December, he’s still popular with boxing fans. Many of them believe the only reason he lost to Joshua was that he didn’t train hard enough. They think that if Ruiz knuckles down and trains hard, he’ll beat Joshua or any other heavyweight in the division.

At this point, Ruiz is experiencing the same thing that other good fighters have dealt with when they’ve come into a lot of money. A lot of boxers are ruined once they make a ton of money. Many of them slack off with the training and end up getting beaten repeatedly and then retiring. Then you get there that retire immediately after the get a big payday. Marvin Hagler is an example of that. He retired after he hit it big against Sugar Ray Leonard and never returned to the game.