By Aragon Garcia: Andy Ruiz Jr. sounds more motivated than ever in saying that he “can’t wait” to get back in action with his career. The exciting former IBF/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Ruiz Jr. (33-2, 22 KOs), is training on his own getting ready to start working with his new coach Eddy Reynoso.
Ruiz, 30, is starting fresh with a new trainer to climb back to the top and regain the three titles that he lost to Anthony Joshua last December in Saudi Arabie. He didn’t the right way for that fight, but now he’s got his focus down and his mind right.
There still isn’t an opponent yet for Ruiz’s next fight, but his dad says they want Chris Arreola (38-6-1, 33 KOs). That’s a tough fight for Ruiz to take because Arreola is still capable of beating a lot of the top 15 contenders when he’s in shape. He almost beat Adam Kownacki last August in a 12 round decision.
Whether Ruiz gets Arreola as his next opponent is unimportant. He’ll get a quality opponent, and let the fans see what he’s a changed person from the overweight guy that lost to Joshua by a hopelessly one-sided 12 round unanimous decision in Saudi Arabia.
Ruiz Jr. needs to prove his doubters wrong
The first order of business for Ruiz Jr. is to put in the kind of performance in winning that will show the critics and his many doubters wrong. A lot of people believe that Ruiz’s seventh-round TKO win over Joshua in their first fight on June 1, 2019, was from a lucky punch.
They give Ruiz no credit for that win and instead see it was a situation where Joshua got carried away after knocking Andy down in round three. Joshua, looking to get Ruiz out of there, forgot to defend and got caught with a big left hook that he never saw coming.
If you watch that fight, Ruiz was giving Joshua trouble in both the first and the second rounds with his pressure and combination punching. If anything, the lucky punch was from Joshua when he landed the left hook that put Ruiz on the seat of his pants in round three.
Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn said he’s not going to let Ruiz Jr. have a third fight with him unless he proves himself first. Ruiz had the perfect opportunity when Dillian Whyte showed interest in fighting him. However, it looks like the money wasn’t right.
Although Whyte claims that Ruiz was offered a whopping $5 million for the fight, that turned out to be incorrect. There wasn’t that kind of money offered. If it had been $5M, it’s likely that Whyte and Ruiz would be looking to fight behind closed doors instead of Dillian facing Alexander Povetkin.
Andy Jr. needs a big name to get Joshua trilogy
Beating Arreola won’t be a good enough win to get Ruiz the trilogy match against Joshua. He’s going to need to defeat Whyte or some of the other notable contenders in the division.
Ruiz should target these fighters
- Filip Hrgovic
- Michael Hunter
- Adam Kownacki
- Joe Joyce
- Daniel Dubois
- Oscar Rivas
- Joseph Parker
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Can’t wait to get back in the ring, let’s go 🥊🏆🇲🇽 #fbf #comebackseason #teamdestroyer