By Charles Brun: WBO super featherweight champion Jamel Herring and #6 WBO Carl Frampton have a fight in the works for December 19th in London, England.
The Herring vs. Frampton fight winner will need to defend the WBO 130-lb title against #1 contender Shakur Stevenson within 90 days. It’ll be interesting to see if Frampton vacates the WBO title if he beats Herring, as Stevenson would likely beat him in a one-sided fashion.
Herring and Frampton were supposed to fight earlier this year on June 13th in Windsor Park, but the plans for that match were wiped out due to the events with the pandemic.
Top Rank has had its eye on making this fight for over a year now, and it looks like it’s finally happening.
If the Herring fight comes off, Frampton will be taking on his first quality opponent since his loss to IBF featherweight champion Josh Warrington in 2018.
Since that embarrassing defeat by the younger lion Warrington, Frampton has taken a couple of confidence builders in Tyler McCreary and Darren Traynor. Frampton easily won both matches, but he chewed up two years of his career in the process.
Unless Frampton wants to waste all of 2020 accomplishing nothing, he should get the Herring fight over with this year.
‘The Jackal’ Frampton, 33, is looking to capture his third division world title, and that’s important to him. He wants to become the first three-division world champion from his country.
Placing the Herring-Frampton fight a week before Christmas on December 19th is a questionable move, as many boxing fans might not be as eager to see the match-up during the holiday time.
Of course, with the pandemic going on, people may be free to watch it, especially with fewer outside activities options. A lot of boxing fans are going out less due to the risk of becoming ill.
While it’s not the ideal time or Herring (22-2, 10 KOs) and former two-division world champion Frampton (28-2, 16 KOs) to be fighting, it’s as good as it gets. Waiting on that fight would be a mistake for Frampton.
Herring, 34, is looking quite beatable and can’t be depended on to hold onto his WBO 130-lb title for much longer. If Team Frampton waits until 2021 to take the fight with Herring, he could miss his chance and wind up needing to fight the guy that dethrones him.
That would be bad news for Frampton because he matches up well with Herring, and he’d have a great shot at beating him based on how poor he looked in his last fight.
Herring looked dreadful in his last title defense against fringe contender Jonathan Oquendo last September. If not for the referee disqualifying Oquendo in the eight, Herring might have been worn down and stopped.
He certainly looked like he was in distress from the pressure that Oquendo was putting on him at the time of the stoppage. That was supposed to be a tune-up fight for Herring, but Oquendo proved to be more than a match for him.
The fight showed that even fringe level opposition has a good shot at beating Herring, who some boxing fans see as a paper champion. That’s why Frampton needs to fight Herring before one of the good contenders gets to him and takes his title.
Frampton was a good – but not great – 122 and 126-pounder, but he’s out of his league against the top 130-pounders. Top Rank can’t match Frampton against the good super featherweights like Shakur Stevenson, Miguel Berchelt, or Oscar Valdez without him getting beaten – again.