By Sean Jones: IBF mandatory George Kambosos Jr predicts he’s going to destroy Teofimo Lopez when he challenges him for his IBF, WBA, WBC, and WBO lightweight titles on Triller.

The date the location for the Teofimo vs. Kambosos Jr fight is being talked about for June 5th in Miami, Florida, but it still hasn’t been officially announced.

Kambosos (19-0, 10 KOs) feels he’s done more to earn a fight against the 23-year-old Teofimo (16-0, 12 KOs) than Devin Haney and Ryan Garcia based on his recent victories over former world champions Mickey Bey and Lee Seby. There was really nothing that Kambosos, 27, showed in those two fights that separated him from them.

The Australian fighter Kambosos nicked a pair of narrow split decisions against Selby and Bey in fights that were very, very close. The way that Kambosos looked in squeaking by the 34-year-old Selby last October wasn’t nearly as impressive as Josh Warrington’s win over him in 2018.

Similarly, Kambosos’ 10 round split decision win over former IBF lightweight champion 37-year-old Bey in 2019 wasn’t as dominant a victory as Rances Barthelemy and John Molina did in beating him years earlier when he was younger and seemingly at the top of his game.

So what does this say about Kambosos? You can argue that Kambosos is flawed and hasn’t proven himself worthy of fighting Teofimo or any champion for that matter.

You’d like to have seen Kambosos Jr beat one or two of these fighters to earn a title shot against Teofimo:

Vasily Lomachenko
Jorge Linares
Javier Fortuna
Richard Commey

Could Kambosos beat two of those fighters? Probably not. Could he beat even one of them? I don’t think so. Commey and Fortuna are arguably the weakest of those four, and I would favor both of those guys to handily beat Kambosos Jr off of his last two fights against Bey and Selby.

“They can be the ‘four kings’ no problem, but the emperor is coming and coming to rule America,” said Kambosos to The Sun. “I’ve already ruled Australia; I came over to the UK and ruled there.

“Now I’m coming over to rule the U.S and destroy the supposed top leader, their King, the guy who is holding it down for them. I’ve earned it the hardest way,” said Kambosos.

This writer is trying to figure out what Kambosos means by saying that he’s earned his title shot against Teofimo Lopez “the hardest way.”

If Kambosos calls his wins over past his prime 37-year-old Bey and 34-year-old Selby as being the “hardest way,” I’d have to disagree with him vehemently.

Kambosos didn’t have it nearly as hard fighting the old guy’s Bey and Selby to earn a title shot compared to what it could have been had the International Boxing Federation insisted that he face Lomachenko Linares, Commey, or Fortuna.

Kambosos would be running the gauntlet if he had to fight two of those four fighters, and I can’t see him beating any of them. He had difficulty beating the old-timer’s Bey and Selby, neither of which are big punchers.

“Lopez has all the belts; he’s beat three former or world champions, the second guy is myself, I’ve beaten two former world champions,” said Kambosos in talking about his wins over Bey and Selby.

Triller won the recent purse bid with a $6.2 million bid to put on the Teofimo vs. Kambosos show, and some believe they overpaid by $2 million.

Matchroom Boxing didn’t bid anywhere near much, and Top Rank wasn’t going to dump that kind of money in the fight because it’s not a big one.

Triller is obviously counting on the fans purchasing the fight on pay-per-view based on them liking Teofimo Lopez enough to make them want it to purchase it despite him not facing a well-known opponent. They could be wrong.

If Triller fails to turn a profit on the fight, it’ll be interesting to see if they choose to continue to bid for fights in the future? There’s nothing wrong with a company paying more than a fight is worth, but it doesn’t make sense to overpay for a fight that is as low-level as the Teofimo vs. Kambosos fight is.

That fight is a poor mismatch on paper, and the reason for that is, Kambosos looked very, very average in his fights, the old-timer’s Mickey Bey and Lee Selby. If Kambosos were for real, he would have dominated those two guys. I mean, it’s not rocket science.

Levitating!🕴🏻✨ @triller pic.twitter.com/62eqpDV6sM

— Teofimo Lopez (@TeofimoLopez) March 10, 2021