By Sean Jones: WBC middleweight champion Jermall Charlo seems disinterested in his upcoming title defense against obscure fighter Juan Macias Montiel in their headliner on Showtime Boxing on June 19th.
In a sign of how desperate Charlo (31-0, 22 KOs) is for a big fight, he called out retired 47-year-old Oscar De La Hoya last week after telling Canelo Alvarez that he’d been ducking Jermall.
Jermall calling out the wrong guy
De La Hoya was paying Jermall a compliment by saying that Canelo has been ducking him all this time.
Interestingly, instead of Jermall ratcheting up the pressure on Canelo to fight him, he attacked De La Hoya, calling him dumb and saying that he’s a cross-dresser.
The only conclusion you can come up with for why Jermall started attacking De La Hoya and calling him out is that he doesn’t want any of that smoke from Canelo.
That’s the only thing that makes sense. I mean, why wouldn’t Jermall join in with De La Hoya and point out that Canelo has been avoiding him if he wasn’t afraid to fight him?
“Oscar De La Hoya, let’s fight each other in a celebrity match,” said Jermall Charlo last week on social media. “I’ll fight Oscar De La Hoya for my WBC. It’s just like me fighting this goofy-a*** dude Montiel.
“Oscar doesn’t want no smoke with me. Yeah, you’re scared of Jermall Charlo, you cross-dressing a**, bum a**, weak a** Latino. You’re not even from Mexico.
“We already knew you’re ducking. Oscar is in rehab right now. He’s not going to answer your text messages. I’ll beat Oscar’s a** up tomorrow and fight Montiel in the same week.
“Oscar De La Hoya, don’t mention my name no more. You make yourself look weak as f***. You mentioned the wrong Charlo, you stupid a**, you dummy,” said a happy-sounding Jermall.
It’s troubling the way that Jermall sounded like he was begging De La Hoya for a fight. Jermall is too needy for someone that is a world champion at 160.
Is Jermall pleased with the way he’s matched?
If Jermall wants a quality opponent, he needs to put some fire under the backsides of his management at PBC to start matching him against live bodies instead of the dreck they’ve been feeding him.
Charlo could have rejected Montiel as an opponent for him if he’d wanted to, but he didn’t, and that tells me he’s on board with this kind of match-making.
Hopefully, Charlo is taking care of himself because he does have a fight coming up on June 19th against Montiel. Charlo sounded a little happy while trash-talking De La Hoya.
There’s very little interest from boxing fans in a fight between Charlo and the #4 WBC Montiel (22-4-2, 22 KOs) in their upcoming fight. Unfortunately, Charlo being matched continually against soft opposition has become a pattern since he moved up to 160.
Montiel is just a continuation of the lackluster fodder Jermall has been facing at 160. It seems obvious at this point that Jermall won’t be fighting any live opposition until World Boxing Council finally ranks a talented contender at the #1 spot at 160.