WBA declines to sanction Luis Ortiz-Tony Thompson bout

Luis "King Kong" Ortiz (24-0, 21 KOs) is set to take on Tony Thompson (40-6, 27 KOs) this weekend on HBO's Boxing After Dark card live from Washington D.C. -- but his WBA interim title won't be up for grabs with the sanctioning body refusing to sanction the bout.

"The WBA has no objection to a stay-busy fight, as long as it's called a stay-busy fight and not misrepresented as a title bout, which appears to be the case," the WBA said.

The WBA goes on to reference that Thompson doesn't deserve a shot at the title considering that he's 2-3 in his last five fights with his most recent outing being a decision loss to Malik Scott last October. He also isn't even rated in the WBA's top 15 fighters in the heavyweight division, so I certainly have no issue with their rationale.

Meanwhile, the WBA continues its campaign to reduce their number of champions in the heavyweight division down to one. In an effort to do so, they've mandated a tournament which would have Ortiz face Alexander Ustinov by June 19th. The other participants in the heavyweight tourney would include the winner of Fury-Klitschko II and the Ruslan Chagaev-Lucas Browne winner (who will have to immediately face Fres Oquendo).

Should Tony Thompson pull off the upset win over Ortiz this weekend, he would not replace Ortiz's slot in the tourney against Ustinov.