By Charles Brun: Eddie Hearn is interested in making a fight between welterweight contenders David Avanesyan and Daniyar Yeleussinov, and if not them, he’d like to match either of those two against #2 WBO Vergil Ortiz Jr.
The Matchroom Boxing promoter Hearn told the AK & Barak show that he’s planning on making the fight between 2016 Olympic gold medalist Daniyar Yeleussinov (10-0, 6 KOs) and the EBU 147-lb champion David Avanesyan (27-3-1, 15 KOs).
Avanesyan, 32, is coming off a big sixth-round knockout win over Josh Kelly last month on February 20th at the Wembley Arena in London, UK.
Hearn needs to keep Avanesyan, and the 30-year-old southpaw Yeleussinov busy fighting important matches, and the best way to do that is for them to fight each other.
But if Hearn can’t set up a fight between those two, he’d be open to matching them against Vergil Ortiz Jr (17-0, 17 KOs).
Putting Avanesyan or Yeleussinov in with Vergil, 22, right now would be the fastest way possible to get them in position to challenge for a world title.
Yeleussinov has been a pro since 2018, and he’s coming off the biggest win of his career last November with a second-round knockout over former IBF/WBA light welterweight champion Julius ‘Blue Machine’ Indongo in Hollywood, Florida.
While it was a nice victory for Yeleussinov, it didn’t mean as much as it would have had he fought Indongo years ago when he still held the IBF & WBA 140-lb titles. Indongo is now 38 and well past his best years.
Avanesyan’s punching power might be too much for Yeleussinov to deal with, as he’s got true world-class strength. It might be too much of a step up for Yeleussinov power-wise to be going against a puncher like Avanesysan right now.
As far as other options for Avanesyan and Yeleussinov, Hearn might want to consider setting them up against the Top Rank promoted Egidijus ‘Mean Machine’ Kavaliauskas rather than Vergil Ortiz Jr.
Kavaliauskas would be a good preliminary fight to get Avanesyan or Yeleussinov ready to face a puncher like Vergil Ortiz.
You can argue that Kavaliauskas (22-1-1, 18 KOs) punches as hard as Vergil, but he’s older at 32-years-old, and he’s not a combination puncher like him. You’ll never see ‘Mean Machine’ attacking his opponents with powerful combinations the way that Vergil is capable of doing.
But Kavaliauskas does hit very hard. He’d be the ideal opponent to get Avanesyan or Yeleussinov ready for Ortiz Jr or a world champion like Errol Spence Jr or Terence Crawford.