FIGHTING SULTAN IS NOT IDEAL AND NOTHING TO GAIN FOR ANCAJAS
By Maloney L. Samaco
PhilBoxing.com
Tue, 13 Feb 2018
There is a great possibility for world junior bantamweight champion Jerwin Ancajas to face fellow Filipino Jonas Sultan, who was declared by the IBF as Ancajas? mandatory challenger, in his next title defense. ?Businesswise, it seems not ideal for Ancajas,? said boxing analyst Dennis Principe over ABS-CBN Sports. ?After that impressive debut at the US, logic dictates that you have to stay there for the meantime.? Even if Ancajas faces Sultan in the US, American fans would not accept the fight, said Principe.
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Ed Tolentino, another fight analyst, doesn?t find any advantage for Ancajas in winning over Sultan. ?For me, Ancajas should go after the bigger names. Nothing to gain in Sultan fight,? the lawyer boxing expert said. ?I mean, what gain can be possibly realized in taking on and possibly beating a countryman?? Sultan is a fighter from ALA Boxing Gym, scored an upset over former two-weight division champion Johnriel Casimero last September to get the IBF mandatory challenge for the title.
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In Tolentino's opinion, the mandatory assignment could probably affect Sultan, whose pro record is 14-3. Ancajas, on the other hand, is a more seasoned fighter with a better 21-1 record. ?Sultan can be groomed further and can be a champ too if he plays his cards right,? said Tolentino. Principe said Ancajas, considering KO victory over Mexico?s Gonzalez, should follow the same route taken by his idol and co-promter Manny Pacquiao. ?Why not create another Manny Pacquiao phenom? Remember Manny's selling point is his being ?Mexicutioner? early in his career. Most successful cards he was starred in were against a well-known Mexican fighter,? stated Principe.
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?So if you want to be a Manny Pacquiao or follow his path, take and stop as many Mexicans as he can. After all the superflyweight is a Mexican-heavy division.? But Ancajas' team could not do otherwise but follow the mandatory order of the boxing body. "In the IBF we have a mandatory with another Filipino Jonas Sultan," said MP Promotions matchmaker Sean Gibbons in an interview over ESPN. "We're looking into that. If we have to do that fight we'll do it. If not, we'll see what's out there. But we're kind of looking at the mandatory right now."
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Joe Ramos of MP Promotions, Ancajas' co-promoter, also pointed at Sultan as the next possible opponent. "Obviously the mandatory is Jonas Sultan of the Philippines," Ramos said. "We'll go there and see what happens." Sultan (14-3, 9 KOs) is the IBF's mandatory no. 1 challenger. If an Ancajas-Sultan championship match would happen , it will be the first time in almost 93 years that two Filipinos will clash for a world boxing title fight. The last all-Filipino championship fight was in May 1925 when Pancho Villa beat Clever Sencio to retain his world flyweight championship in Manila.
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Roy Jones Jr ended his 29-year professional career with a domineering 10-round unanimous decision against Scott Sigmon in what was his 75th professional fight. ?I understand there?s a lot of great fighters who?ve followed me already since I was the champ - and I hope there?s another who comes along does even better because want to see that - but I haven?t seen anyone do what I did yet. I haven?t seen anyone turn pro at 154lbs and win the heavyweight championship of the world,? Jones was quoted by BoxingScene after his last win just weeks short of his 50th birthday. "So, pound-for-pound the greatest of all time? It isn?t hard to figure out, Roy Jones Junior is your king of the hill.?
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Bleacher Report published a list in 2012 and had Jones ranked 39th, one place ahead of Tommy Hearns but 12 slots behind Bernard Hopkins. ESPN?s list, published in 2006 after Jones suffered three straight losses, had Jones ranked 46, one place ahead of Hopkins but seven slots behind Oscar De La Hoya. The Sportster?s list, published in 2015, does not rank Jones in the top 25, but Joe Calzaghe is at 24.
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Jones had in the fourth round in his fight against Vinny Pazienza, becoming the first fighter in CompuBox history to go an entire round without being hit by his opponent. He became the first athlete to compete in two professiinalsports in the same day when he played a basketball game in the morning and knocked out Eric Lucas in the 11th round to defend his IBF super middleweight title in the evening.
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Roy Jones Jr. had a career in boxing from 1989 to 2018. He is a six-time world champion in four weight classes, having held titles at middleweight, super middleweight, light heavyweight, and heavyweight. Jones is the only boxer in history to start his professional career at light middleweight and later win a heavyweight title. As an amateur boxer, he fought for the United States at the 1988 Summer Olympics, winning a silver medal in the light middleweight division.
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The rematch between Saul "Canelo" Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin is now set for May 5th, with the IBF, IBO, WBC, WBA middleweight world titles at stake. Last September at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, the first match between Canelo (49-1-2, 34 KOs) and Golovkin (37-0-1, 33 KOs) resulted in a controversial twelve round split draw. Canelo then promised to end this fight via knockout, because he doesn't want any result to be tainted by controversies in scoring or any other forms complaints after the rematch.
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"Saul said the other day that he was going to knock Golovkin out so there is no doubt about anything, not even with the judges and also Golovkin said the same thing. The mood is getting warmer and I think it's good for the fight, because the two of them are going to go out and look for the knockout - but as I have always said, in boxing there is no formula to achieve the knockout, we are going to work very hard to win the fight," said Jose "Chepo" Reynoso, who is the manager and co-trainer of the Mexican superstar. ''The knockout is very possible, because Canelo has already adapted to this weight division. Because if you really take a good look at the fight, Saul hurt Golovkin and we never saw Golovkin hurt Canelo," Chepo said.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Maloney L. Samaco.
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