By Sean Jones: Jaime Munguia is in negotiations to fight against former middleweight world title challenger Maciej Sulecki in April. It’s a risky fight for Munguia to take the well-seasoned Sulecki, who is capable of exploiting his flaws in the same way Dennis Hogan did in 2019.
Sulecki, 31, will be a good test for Munguia. If he wins this fight, he will show that he’s capable of beating a world-class fighter.
Hopefully, Munguia has thought this idea through and understands what he’s getting himself into in taking on Sulecki. The Polish gave Daniel Jacobs and Demetrius Andrade all they could handle.
What Sulecki showed in those fights is a guy more than capable of beating Munguia.
On the flip side, a loss for Munguia or another poor performance like we’ve seen from him on many occasions. Another bad effort from Munguia, and it would be made clear that he’s never going to take his career to the next level.
This isn’t the fight that fans wanted to see involving the 24-year-old Munguia, as they were hoping he would take on IBF middleweight champion Gennadiy ‘GGG’ Golovkin, but nothing came of that match.
Munguia’s promoters at Golden Boy likely recognized that he’s nowhere near ready for GGG, even though he’s about to turn 39 next month.
Putting Munguia in with Golovkin would be a terrible idea at this point because he’s not shown the kind of talent in his game to compete with the Kazakhstan fighter.
Chris Mannix of SI reports that talks are underway between former WBO junior middleweight champion Munguia (36-0, 29 KOs) and Sulecki (29-2, 11 KOs).
Munguia has looked improved lately with wins over Tureano Johnson, Gary ‘Spike’ O’Sullivan, and Patrick Allotey. Unfortunately, those guys weren’t talented enough to take full advantage of the holes Munguia has in his defense.
O’Sullivan did have Munguia hurt on one occasion in their fight last year in January, but he couldn’t capitalize on the situation.
“Jaime Munguia is progressing towards a deal to face former title challenger Maciej Sulecki in April, sources told @SInow. Munguia (36-0) had been in the mix to face @GGGBoxing,” said @SIChrisMannix.
Munguia is ranked #1 WBC, #1 WBO, #4 IBF, and #6 WBA at 160. The champions that Munguia is in a position to challenge, Demetrius Andrade and Jermall Charlo, are clearly too good for him right now.
The best bet for Munguia to win a belt is if WBC champion Charlo (31-0, 22 KOs) vacates his title to move up to 168.
With his #1 ranking with the World Boxing Council, Munguia could fight for the vacant WBC 160-lb title against likely Sergey Derevyanchenko.
Also, Munguia could challenge WBA 160lb champion Ryota Murata if given a chance, but that’s not likely.
Canelo Alvarez or Golovkin are expected to take on Murata in Japan, which would be a big money fight for them. There’s very little chance that Murata would take on a young lion
.