By Craig Daly: Recently dethroned former WBC featherweight champion Mark Magsayo and former WBA/WBC super bantamweight champion Brandon Figueroa will battle it out at 126 this Saturday, live on Showtime & FITE TV.
The WBC had ordered Figueroa (23-1-1, 18 KOs) to fight Stephen Fulton for the interim 126-lb belt, but Stephen had chosen to stay at 122 for the time being to defend against Naoya Inoue next.
Magsayo (24-1, 16 KOs) lost his WBC featherweight title in a 12 round split decision to Rey Vargas last July in San Antonio, Texas.
WHAT TIME IS FIGUEROA VS. MAGSAYO?
- Date: Saturday, March 4
- Main card: 1 a.m. GMT / 8 p.m. ET
- Main event ringwalks (approx): 4 a.m. GMT / 11 p.m. ET
- The fight will take place at the Toyota Arena, Ontario, California.
- Showtime will broadcast the fight in the U.S.
- The main card is set to get underway at 1 a.m. GMT / 8 p.m. ET with the main event ringwalks scheduled for 4 a.m. GMT / 11 p.m.
The defeat ended the brief six-month reign for the 27-year-old Magsayo as the WBC 126-lb champion after he’d previously beat longtime champion Gary Russell Jr by a 12 round majority decision last January in a close fight.
Russell, 34, had held the WBC title for an incredible seven years, but he’d only defended it six times due to his decision to make rare defenses.
Most boxing fans would agree that if Russell Jr weren’t nursing an arm injury, he would have soundly beaten Magsayo because he was doing a pretty good job of holding his own with just one arm. You can only imagine what Russell would have done if he’d been 100% healthy.
Figueroa, 26, lost his WBC super bantamweight title to Stephen Fulton by a 12 round majority decision in November 2021. Since that defeat, Figueroa had fought just once, beating Carlos Castro by a sixth round knockout last July at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas.
Depending on how much the loss to Fulton took out of Figueroa, he should have enough boxing skills to outbox Magsayo. With that said, Magsayo has excellent power, and he could make it tough on Figueroa in a war.
Figueroa wins his fights with his high-volume attacks, which will put him in harm’s way of the hard shots from Magsayo. This is one of those fights that is difficult to predict a winner due to both fighters bringing different elements to their games.
FIGUEROA VS. MAGSAYO FIGHT CARD
- Brandon Figueroa vs. Mark Magsayo; Featherweight
- Amilcar Vidal vs. Elijah Lorenzo Garcia; Middleweight
- Jarrett Hurd vs. Jose Armando Resendiz; Middleweight
- Terrell Gausha vs. Brandyn Lynch; Super welterweight
- Justin DeLoach vs. Travon Marshall; Welterweight
- Enriko Gogokhia vs. Samuel Teah; Super lightweight
- Miguel Angel Hernandez vs. Dario Guerrero-Meneses; Middleweight
- Albert Gonzalez vs. Joseph Cruz Brown; Featherweight
- Daniel Blancas vs. Kynndale Prather; Super middleweight