Rankings are generally posted each Tuesday at Noon ET, but there won’t be any ranked fights until Jan. 11, in fact, so next week there will be no rankings update on Jan. 7, as nothing will have changed unless someone announces a retirement or the like. But even if that happens, no update next Tuesday.
Ranked fights the next two weeks:
- Light Heavyweight: (10) Jesse Hart vs Joe Smith Jr, Jan. 11
- Junior Middleweight: (7) Jaime Munguia vs Gary O’Sullivan [160], Jan. 11
Upcoming Fights: (1) Tyson Fury vs (2) Deontay Wilder, Feb. 22
Notes: Goulamirian fought again on Saturday in France, retaining his WBA title with a 10th round stoppage of Constantin Bejenaru. Goulamirian fought twice at the end of the year, Nov. 15 and Dec. 28, beating a couple of guys who might charitably called fringe contenders (the other was Kane Watts), but he fought and got the job done, retaining his title and staying firm where he is.
Upcoming Fights: (5) Kevin Lerena vs Firat Arslan, Feb. 8
Notes: I’m keeping Pascal and Jack where they were going into their fight on Saturday, which Pascal won via split decision, and very easily could have gone the other way. It was a tremendous fight between the two veterans; both guys are in the back stretches of their careers, but still have something left in the tank. Pascal through Jack here is grouped very tightly, and I just couldn’t see bumping Zurdo Ramirez over Jack. Ramirez’ only fight at 175 is a win over Tommy Karpency, and while I respect his ability and achievements at 168 enough to have him ranked in a division that gets sketchy around that point, Jack doesn’t deserve to be penalized for taking a good fight and narrowly losing, not until Ramirez does something more substantial. January has some stuff going on, with Hart and Alvarez in action on back-to-back-weekends.
Upcoming Fights: (10) Jesse Hart vs Joe Smith Jr, Jan. 11 ... (7) Eleider Alvarez vs Michael Seals, Jan. 18 ... (1) Artur Beterbiev vs Meng Fanlong, TBA
Notes: Jose Uzcategui, a former titleholder, is obviously out after his upset loss to Lionell Thompson. Tough year for Uzcategui; the Venezuelan lost his IBF belt to Caleb Plant in January and then ended the campaign losing to Thompson. It’s clear he has real problems with smart, skilled boxers, which I suppose says a lot about Andre Dirrell. I gave a little consideration to having Thompson take the spot in a weak division, but I went with Fedor Chudinov coming back in after a week gone.
Upcoming Fights: (4) Caleb Plant vs Vincent Feigenbutz, Feb. 15
Upcoming Fights: (3) Demetrius Andrade vs Luke Keeler, Jan. 30 ... (2) Gennadiy Golovkin vs Kamil Szeremeta, TBA
Upcoming Fights: (7) Jaime Munguia vs Gary O’Sullivan [middleweight], Jan. 11 ... (1) Julian Williams vs Jeison Rosario, Jan. 18 ... (2) Jarrett Hurd vs Francisco Santana, Jan. 25 ... (9) Kell Brook vs Mark DeLuca, Feb. 8
Upcoming Fights: (6) Danny Garcia vs Ivan Redkach, Jan. 25 ... (7) Yordenis Ugas vs Mike Dallas Jr, Feb. 1
Upcoming Fights: (2) Jose Ramirez vs (6) Viktor Postol, Feb. 1
Notes: Gervonta “Tank” Davis is in at 135. Beating Yuriorkis Gamboa isn’t the most amazing thing at this point, but then neither is anything the rest of these guys have been doing. Fortuna’s 2019 saw him edge one past Sharif Bogere, who had been on a milk carton for about six years, then run over Jesus Cuellar, which Davis had already done in 2018. Davis has legitimate potential as a lightweight, but he lands at No. 6 for now; the top five here are all guys I think he’d have serious trouble with based on Saturday’s performance. Dropping out is Jorge Linares, who was No. 9 last week. Linares came into a ranking here basically because someone had to be ranked at that moment, but when I reexamined it for this week, Selby’s wins over Omar Douglas and Ricky Burns this year are just more impressive than Linares moving up to 140 and getting trucked by Pablo Cesar Cano, then moving back toward 135 to beat a club guy in Japan. If Linares fought Selby I’d pick Linares, and he does intend to fight at 135 in 2020, it seems, but we’ll see. Let him come back with something good.
Upcoming Fights: (1) Vasiliy Lomachenko vs (2) Teofimo Lopez, TBA ... (4) Luke Campbell vs (7) Javier Fortuna, TBA ... (10) Lee Selby vs George Kambosos Jr, TBA
Notes: With Tank up to 135, that left a hole at 130. I’ve gone with unbeaten Russian Shavkatdzhon Rakhimov, a 25-year-old southpaw originally from Tajikistan. He’s been solid as a pro to date, but opposition hasn’t been special or anything. That said BoxRec figure him as No. 2 in the division, which I think is an insane glitch of the formula, but he definitely has the look of a contender.
Upcoming Fights: (3) Tevin Farmer vs (7) Joseph Diaz Jr, Jan. 30 ... (9) Masayuki Ito vs Yongqiang Yang, Feb. 1
Upcoming Fights: (2) Gary Russell Jr vs (4) Tugstsogt Nyambayar, Feb. 8 ... (6) Kid Galahad vs (9) Claudio Marrero, Feb. 8 ... (10) Ryan Walsh vs TBA, Feb. 21
Upcoming Fights: (2) Daniel Roman vs (10) Murodjon Akhmadaliev, Jan. 30
Upcoming Fights: (1) Naoya Inoue vs TBA, Apr. 25
Notes: Ioka keeps his WBO title and stays at No. 4 after a win over mandatory challenger Jeyvier Cintron, who wasn’t ranked but wasn’t far outside the top 10, either, a quality victory for the Japanese veteran. There are so many good fights to make in this division. Hopefully we see them made soon.
Upcoming Fights: TBA
Notes: Tanaka hangs at No. 1 to close the year following his New Year’s Eve win over overmatched Wulan Tuolehazi. Any matchup of the top four here would be more than welcome; hell, throw Acosta in there, too, that dude always comes to rumble.
Upcoming Fights: (4) Artem Dalakian vs Josber Perez, Feb. 8
Upcoming Fights: TBA
Upcoming Fights: (10) Lito Dante vs Sulis Barrera, Feb. 8