Alright, a quick recap before we start.
During their annual convention earlier this month, the WBC ordered no. 3 lightweight Jadier Herrera to face no. 1 Ricardo Nunez for the interim title. This is a rare case where such a fight is justified, as reigning champ Shakur Stevenson is challenging Teofimo Lopez for the super lightweight belt early next year.
Days later, Stephen Fulton missed weight for what was supposed to be a super featherweight title fight against champion O’Shaquie Foster. PBC successfully petitioned the WBC to sanction it as an interim lightweight title fight instead, leaving Foster in possession of two (one and a half?) pieces of hardware after dominating “Cool Boy Steph.”
Luckily for Sulaiman and co., Foster elected to ditch the new duds, leaving the belt free for Herrera and Nunez to fight over on the January 10th Agit Kabayel vs Damian Knyba show in Oberhausen.
Herrera (17-0, 15 KO) is one of the new-school Cuban wrecking balls, dispatching his last nine foes inside the distance. He’s still got some growing to do at 23 years old, but the power looks very real and he’s got serious size for the division at 5’11”.
It’s not immediately clear to me how Nunez (26-7, 22 KO) got so high in the WBC’s rankings. He’s not far removed from a three-fight skid that saw him fall to Alberty Batyrgaziev, Zaur Abdullaev, and Masanori Rikiishi and is actually coming off a DQ loss to Jon Fernandez at 140 for shots after the bell. Still, he’s got a couple good wins under his belt and is a reasonable opponent for this stage in Herrera’s development, packing enough power to punish the youngster’s defensive lapses if he’s not on the ball.
