Juan Estrada vs. Joshua Franco & Bam Rodriguez vs. Rungvisai doubleheader in the works

By Boxing News - 03/06/2022 - Comments

By Dan Ambrose: Eddie Hearn revealed last Saturday that he’s planning a big doubleheader with Juan Estrada vs. Joshua Franco and Jesse ‘Bam’ Rodriguez vs. Srisakat Sor Rungvisai for Antonio, Texas. This would be an excellent card for DAZN if Hearn can get it made.

If WBA/WBC Franchise super flyweight champion Estrada (42-3, 28 KOs) defeats WBA ‘regular 115-lb champion Franco 18-1-2, 8 KOs), Hearn will match him against Roman ‘Chocolatito’ Gonzalez for their trilogy match.

Interestingly, Hearn has convinced himself that newly crowned WBC super flyweight champion Jesse ‘Bam’ Rodriguez (15-0, 10 KOs) will beat everybody in the 115-lb division, and that’s not likely to be the case.

Rodriguez, 22, is young to be taking on a fighter with the power, size, and experience of the 35-year-old former WBC champion Rungvisai (50-5-1, 43 KOs). The Thai fighter already beat Chocolatito twice, and Estrada once.

Even in the rematch with Estrada, which Rungvisai lost by a 12 round unanimous decision in 2019, he looked like he was just getting started. Rungvisai was not at his best for that fight, yet he still gave Estrada huge problems with his power.

Image: Juan Estrada vs. Joshua Franco & Bam Rodriguez vs. Rungvisai doubleheader in the works

If Rungvisai wins, it would be a waste of time for Chocolatito to fight him again because that’s a bad match-up for him. Rungvisai hits too hard for Chocolatito to fight him again, and his style of fighting is wrong.

Estrada and a prime Carlos Cuadras beat Rungvisai by using in and out movement to keep him from landing his heavy punches.

“We’re thinking of doing a doubleheader between Estrada and Franco and Jesse Rodriguez and Rungvisai in San Antonio,” said Eddie Hearn to iFL TV.

“But the trilogy [between Estrada and Chocolatito] is still a huge fight, but we’ll have to see. We’ll go over it tonight, and then we’ll go from there,” Hearn said.

Juan Estrada will likely take care of Joshua Franco without any trouble. That’s a very winnable fight for him. The only two guys at super flyweight that can trouble Estrada are Chocolatito and Rungvisai, as we’ve seen.

Last year, Estrada won a controversial 12 round split decision over Chocolatito in their rematch in Dallas, Texas in March 2021. The fans at ringside then booed Estrada, which told you everything you need to know about what they thought of the decision.

Before the fight started, the crowd was backing Estrada, cheering him loudly, but at the end, Chocolatito had them eating out of his hand like lapdogs due to his impressive performance.

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