By Craig Page: Trainer Derek Bozy Ennis says his son, Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis will be fighting on December 17th, possibly against Emantas Stanionis.
Bozy wants #1 IBF Boots (29-0, 27 KOs) to be fighting two to three times a year, but thus far, he’s only fought once in 2023, knocking out Custio Clayton in the second round last May.
According to Bozy, the Errol Spence Jr vs. Terence Crawford fight has held things up in the weight class for Boots Ennis. Everyone is waiting for that fight to take place so that they can get a shot at one or all of the four titles at 147.
Boots, 25, is the IBF mandatory for Spence’s belt, and he wants his shot at that title. They’ve already petitioned the IBF for Boots Ennis to fight Spence for that belt, especially now that his fight with Crawford is no longer happening this year. Crawford signed to fight David Avanesyan on December 10th.
Bozy says they asked Avanesyan for a fight, but he turned it down. Ennis wants anyone in the top five. Ideally, they’d like to fight former WBA/WBC welterweight champion Keith ‘One Time’ Thurman, but he wants $10 million to fight Boots Ennis, according to Bozy.
For Thurman to be asking for that much money against a contender tells you how much respect he has for him.
It’s probably unrealistic for Boots & Bozy to hope that Thurman will fight him because the 33-year-old ‘One Time’ rarely fights anymore, and he appears to have lost his ambition.
If Spence or Crawford are going to stay at 147 for much longer, they will need to fight Boots Ennis because they can’t sit on their titles indefinitely, as if they’re permanent belts that they don’t need to work to hold onto.
Top five welterweight contenders:
- Vergil Ortiz
- Conor Benn
- Yordenis Ugas
- David Avanesyan
- Keith Thurman
“Boots just won an eliminator, so he’s #1 for the IBF,” said Derek Bozy Ennis to In this Corner Boxing 24 when asked Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis. “We’ve only fought one time this year against the boy from Canada [Custio Clayton last May].
“We want to fight two, three times a year, and we don’t like that [inactivity for Boots]. So I talked to [Showtime executive Stephen] Espinoza and told him, ‘We need to fight. Get us something in December or something.’
“We’re supposed to be fighting in December on December 17th or something like that. I told him that we want someone in the top five. We’re not going backwards. We’re not going to ten or nine or nothing like that.
“We want top five, six, or seven, and he [Espinoza] said, ‘That’s what we’ll do, but he said we’ll see where Spence and Crawford are coming from.’ That’s what he said. Now, we found out where they’re coming from.
“Crawford is going to be fighting this boy [David] Avanesyan. That’s who we wanted to fight, but he turned us down. We’ve been asking for him. He was supposed to fight [Vergil] Ortiz one time, but Ortiz turned him down. That’s what I heard.
“We [Boots Ennis] want everyone in the top five. We asked all them guys. So that’s what we’re waiting on. I don’t know who he [Espinoza] is going to get for us, but he’s going to get somebody.
“With the way, it’s going with Spence and Crawford, we might get [WBA ‘regular’ welterweight champion Emantas] Stanionis. We might get him, or we might get [Keith] Thurman. I hope we get one of them.
“Thurman wanted $10 million to fight Boots. Come on, man. You don’t make ten million. Why would you want ten million to fight Boots? I know it’s high-risk, low reward, but you never made ten million fighting Pacquiao.
“We don’t like waiting because Boots always stays in the gym. He’s been here all week,” said Bozy.
