A cocky IBF 112-lb champion, Sunny Edwards is already looking past his unbeaten opponent, WBO champ Jesse ‘Bam’ Rodriguez, for this Saturday, aiming towards unification fights against the other two belt-holders Artem Dalakian [WBA] and Julio Cesar Martinez [WBC].
Sunny’s arrogance is out of this world, and he is a classic example of a fighter who doesn’t know what he’s getting himself into until it’s too late.
The young talent ‘Bam’ Rodriguez will have the crowd backing him this Saturday, December 16th, when he battles Sunny live on DAZN from the Desert Diamond Arena in Glendale, Arizona.
Bam has got superstar written all over him, and this fight here figures to be easy stuff for the 23-year-old on his way to bigger & better things at 115, 122, 126, 130 & 135. Those are all weight classes that Bam Rodriguez expects to conquer.
Unfortunately, Rodriguez won’t stick around at 112 to grab all the belts, as he’s focused on the more lucrative fights in the other divisions, and he’s not going to stunt his career by staying at this dead, barren of-life weight class and languish in obscurity, as poor Sunny is doing.
Sunny: Looking Beyond the Horizon
It could be a mistake on the part of Edwards to be looking beyond his fight against ‘Bam’ Rodriguez (18-0, 11 KOs), who is the apex predator for the 112-lb division, on top of the food chain, and ready to enjoy another easy meal against the light-hitting Sunny.
“After I beat Bam, I feel there’s a lot more still to come. That’s the first step, unified champion of the world, it sounds good,” said Edwards. “Bam has got quick hands, good feet, heavy hands as well. He’s a great fighter, but he’s not been in with me yet.
The last time we saw the extremely vain Edwards, he was forced to labor to an unimpressive twelve round decision against the Chilean Andres Campos last June in a fight that was undecided until the championship rounds.
Campos was lighting Edwards up like a Christmas tree in the first half of the bout, trapping him against the ropes and unloading on him with nonstop headshots, which Sunny tried to dodge but couldn’t.
Is Edwards asking for trouble?
Edwards has delusions of grandeur, thinking he’s going to defeat Jesse, then move on towards becoming the undisputed champion by beating WBC champion Martinez and WBA champ Dalakian.
That’s not going to happen unless Bam Rodriguez suffers some kind of injury on Saturday night. The good news for Edwards is that he’ll be able to recapture his IBF belt after Bam vacates it when he returns to the 115-lb division.
“Sunny Edwards is a strategist; he’s a technician. He moves very well in the ring, and he boxes extremely intelligently,” said Chris Algieri to ProBox TV, a fighter known for his finesse style of fighting during his career, praising Sunny, a similar fighter as he was.
“Hit and not get hit is the name of the game, and that’s one of the reasons why he’s so confident, and I would say cocky in the way that he talks about his skillset. Dude, he said, ‘I go into a fight, I fight twelve rounds.
“‘I walk out the same way I walked in. I didn’t lose a minute of that fight. Why would I not be confident? Why would I not think I was going to win?’ I understand that mindset; that’s the way you got to be, especially when you’re going against a guy like Bam Rodriguez.”
While Edwards is a defensive wizard, but he’s still hittable when he comes in, looking to land his shots. He’s not a Devin Haney or Shakur Stevenson, who immediately on the retreat after landing one or two shots. Edwards is there to be hit, and he’s not going to be able to run all over the ring all night without Bam trapping him against the ropes and dropping concussive B83 bombs on him from high altitude.
A fight worth watching
“This is not getting a lot of attention, probably because of the weight class,” said Algieri. “On this side of the world [U.S], we don’t look at flyweights like that. We don’t look under 126. Featherweights are where Americans stop paying attention. Anything south of there.
“[Naoya] Inoue, ‘The Monster,’ who is creating a lot of buzz at 122 and below at the bantams, but the flyweights, like a mentioned, Michael Carbajal, Ricardo Lopez. Those are the guys that were popular on this side of the world in those lighter weights, and now we have Bam Rodriguez.
“Sunny, not well known in the weight class, too, because he’s an English guy, now fighting over here in Arizona against Bam; I think it’s good. It brings a lot of attention to both guys and in terms of competitiveness, this might be one of the best fights of the year in match-ups.”
The networks don’t routinely broadcast fights involving flyweights [112-pounders] in main events or co-feature spots in the U.S., so the weight class is out of sight and out of mind for Americans.
Saturday’s bout between Bam Rodriguez & Sunny Edwards is getting a late promotional push, so it’s going to do as well as it would have if the promoters of the event at Matchroom Boxing and DAZN had started earlier.
No mental quitting
“These guys are both psychologically in this fight, and that’s why we can expect fireworks. Bam is 23, and Sunny is 27,” said Algieri. “Those guys, that psychology that they have right now is to win no matter what. These guys will go out on their shields and fight to the end.
“Listen, we saw Regis [Prograis] last week. He was in there, but there was a part of his mind, part of his 34-year-old mind, that packed it in pretty early [against Devin Haney]. He was like, ‘You know what? I’m not going for it, not tonight. This guy hits a little too hard and a little too sharp tonight. I’ll come back and win a third world title somewhere else.'”
Watching Prograis appear to give up against Haney last Saturday night was disappointing, but we won’t see that with Bam and Sunny because they’re not old. Also, there won’t be a huge size disparity as we saw with Prograis taking on the 165-lb Haney, who looked enormous inside the ring.
“These guys aren’t like that. This is their opportunity; this is their platform [DAZN]. They’re at the age where this is the end. It’s funny. As far you’ve been is as far you’ve been. These guys both have only gotten to this point, and they’re not looking back,” said Algieri about Bam Rodriguez and Sunny Edwards.
