Japan's Boxing Golden Age Remains Limited to the Lower Weights
By Teodoro Medina Reynoso
PhilBoxing.com
Thu, 03 Jul 2025
With Japanese fighters holding half of the major titles at flyweight and dominating at bantamweight where they essentially hold all of world belts, Naoya Inoue who has been undisputed super bantamweight king since late 2023 was quoted as saying that Japan could be in its Golden Age in boxing.
But following a spate of world title losses by Japanese fighters at featherweight and above the past few months, this Japan Golden Age of Boxing remains limited to the lower weight classes.
Last May 25, in a fight held in Yokohama, the tall and wiry Masanori Rikiishi failed in his bid to win the vacant IBF world super featherweight championship dropping a unanimous decision to Mexican Eduardo "Sugar" Nunez.
On the same date, in a fight held in Osaka, former bantamweight champion Tomoki Kameda failed in his bid to wrest the WBO featherweight crown from American Angelo Leo, losing by a fighting majority decision.
On June 19 at the Ota City Prefectural Gym in Tokyo, the dream of OPBF titlist Jin Sasaki of winning Japan's first-ever world welterweight crown came crashing down in a brutal 5th round knockout defeat to American WBO champion Brian Norman Jr. In a scene reminiscent of minimumweight Ginjiro Shigeoka's brutal loss to Filipino Pedro Taduran earlier, Sasaki was also later rushed to the hospital after the fight.
Five days before, Hironori Mushiro faced former Olympic gold medalist Andy Cruz of Cuba in a 12 round world title eliminator at the Madison Garden in New York and went down in a 5th round technical knockout defeat. Prior to the stoppage, Mishiro was knocked down twice in the third round. It was supposedly Cruz's first time fighting a twelve round bout in his young pro career. The winner was to be mandatory challenger to newly upgraded IBF champion Raymond Muratalla following the retirement of Vassily Lomachenko.
Given this record of failures above 122 lbs., the pressure has increased on Monster Inoue to move up to the featherweights and try to win a world title and extend his dominance there.
But apparently, this remains beyond his radar for the remainder of 2025 as Inoue is set for yet another defense of his undisputed world super bantamweight title against ex titleholder Morudjon Akhmadaliev of Uzbekistan in Japan this September.
Inoue is set for another fight in December and many fans and pundits alike are expecting it to be the biggest all-Japanese world title fight against unified bantamweight champion Junto Nakatani. It has been reported that Nakatani has asked Inoue to remain at 122 lbs so he could fight a still prime time Naoya, and not someone who may be adversely affected by a move up to 126 lbs. Inoue has reportedly agreed to Nakatani's request.
However it was also reported that top Mexican contender Allan Picasso has change of mind from his earlier refusal to take on Inoue in the USA (resulting to Ricardo Cardenas taking his place) and expressed his readiness to challenge the Japanese Monster either in the USA or Japan. Picasso could have seen something in the Inoue-Cardenas bout that emboldened him.
In any case, this recent development has muddled Inoue's plans beyond September 2025 which also supposedly included an initial sally at the featherweights against British Nick Ball.
Will we ever see Inoue moving up to featherweight and winning another world title and breaking Japan's failures beyond 122 lbs?
Part 2: Boxing Golden Age Comparison: Japan Vs The Philippines
The author Teodoro Medina Reynoso is a veteran boxing radio talk show host living in the Philippines. He can be reached at teddyreynoso@yahoo.com and by phone 09215309477.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Teodoro Medina Reynoso.
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