Real or not: Will Canelo KO Berlanga? Lopez the best featherweight? Last of Lomachenko?
IBF featherweight champion Luis Alberto Lopez defends his belt against Angelo Leo in the main event of a Top Rank on ESPN card at Tingley Col iseum in Albuquerque, New Mexico, on Saturday (ESPN/ESPN+, 10 p.m. ET).
Lopez’s last loss was in May 2019 and he has won 14 consecutive fights since, including impressive victories over Josh Warrington in England and Michael Conlan in Northern Ireland. But is he the best featherweight in boxing?
Vasiliy Lomachenko recently rejected a lucrative fight against fellow lightweight champion Gervonta “Tank” Davis and while he hasn’t announced his retirement, will we see “Hi-Tech” in the ring again?
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Saturday, 6:40 p.m. ET on ESPN+: Luis Alberto Lopez vs. Angelo Leo undercard
Saturday, 10 p.m. ET on ESPN and ESPN+: Luis Alberto Lopez vs. Angelo Leo, 12 rounds, for Lopez’s IBF featherweight title
Canelo Alvarez will make his second ring appearance this year, but not against the fighter fans have clamored for. Instead of David Benavidez, Canelo will face Edgar Berlanga, who’s never fought at this level in his short career. While Berlanga possesses incredible power — he started his career with 16 consecutive first-round KOs — can he find a way to win, or at least go the distance against Alvarez?
Former heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua will fight for a title for the first time in two years. Joshua will face IBF champion Daniel Dubois in London, as “AJ” is favored to become a three-time world champion (-550 per ESPN BET).
And two-division champion Danny Garcia returns to the ring for just the second time in almost four years to take on WBA middleweight champion Erislandy Lara. Garcia, who won belts at 140 and 147 pounds, is moving up in weight for the chance to become a three-division champion, but can he upset an older but still powerful Lara?
Mike Coppinger and Nick Parkinson answer these questions and more, trying to distinguish what’s real and what’s not.
Vasiliy Lomachenko throws an onslaught of punches to the body of George Kambosos Jr. that forces the referee to stop the fight in the 11th round.
Not real… for now. Lomachenko is contemplating retirement, sources told ESPN, part of the reason he declined a lucrative fight with Gervonta Davis in November. There’s also a possibility that Lomachenko will return in the first half of 2025 to defend his IBF lightweight title.
After all, Lomachenko (18-3, 12 KOs) appeared in a fighting mood Saturday in Los Angeles: he and Shakur Stevenson had to be separated at ringside during the Terence Crawford-Israil Madrimov card. Lomachenko was seen telling Stevenson, “Let’s go right now.
If that’s any indication, Lomachenko will fight again. Maybe even against Davis or Stevenson, the two biggest fights on the table for him. But if he never laces up the gloves again, Lomachenko’s legacy is secured. He’s a three-division champion, a first-ballot Hall of Famer and a mainstay of the pound-for-pound list over the last 10 years.
He also doesn’t need to fight for the money. He’s earned millions of dollars in his career and still resides in Ukraine, where he’s one of the nation’s most popular athletes. Whether or not he fights again, he surely won’t do so much longer. He turns 37 in February. — Coppinger
Not real. Garcia has upset the odds before, including a shocking KO win over Amir Khan and a dominant decision victory over Lucas Matthysse. The first win lifted him to the upper echelon of the sport and the latter cemented that status.
But the Matthysse fight was 11 years ago, though, and those two signature Garcia wins were at 140 pounds (he also won a title at 147 pounds and moved up to 154 for a July 2022 win over Jose Benavidez Jr.)
Garcia (37-3, 21 KOs) is still searching for a win that matches that, and an upset victory over Lara would fit the bill.
Garcia didn’t resemble the sharp counterpuncher in the majority-decision victory over Benavidez, and he hasn’t competed since. Now, he’ll move up another weight class (though the Lara fight is taking place at a catchweight between 155 and 160 pounds) and have to contend with ring inactivity. The Sept. 14 middleweight title fight against Lara will be Garcia’s second since December 2020, when he was routed by Errol Spence Jr.
The pick here is Lara (30-3-3, 18 KOs), who, even at 41, shows tremendous power, albeit against fighters below Garcia’s level. Lara is riding a three-fight KO streak. — Coppinger
Real. Alvarez, boxing’s top star, hasn’t scored a KO victory since he flattened Caleb Plant in a November 2021 fight to win the undisputed super middleweight championship.
However, Canelo (61-2-2, 39 KOs) has scored a knockdown in his last three fights. Against a fighter in Berlanga, who will be fighting on the top level for the first time, Alvarez should add the 40th KO of his illustrious career.
Berlanga (22-0, 17 KOs) has been hurt in the ring before, namely in a step-up fight against Marcelo Coceres, who dropped him in Round 9. And his defense isn’t exactly sound. Berlanga possesses power (he started his career with 16 consecutive KO wins in the first round), and if he chooses to exchange with Canelo, Alvarez should take him out.
Alvarez promised as much at a pair of news conferences this week to promote the fight. — Coppinger
Not real. Rafael Espinoza looks a real threat to Lopez after tormenting Sergio Chirinho Sanchez in a four-round win in June and defeating Robeisy Ramirez by a majority decision to win the WBO title in December. Espinoza (25-0, 21 KOs) floored Chirinho in three of the four rounds, while his breakout win with Ramirez was one of the best fights in 2023.
At 6-foot-1, Espinoza — the tallest world featherweight champion in history — would be a challenge for Lopez. Chirinho did well to get up from an uppercut from Espinoza in Round 1, before he was soon overpowered. As a professional, Chirinho had never been knocked down before Espinoza swept him aside.
Espinoza produced a shock in beating two-time Olympic gold medallist Ramirez, and he outlanded him in the last three rounds. Although he is not as experienced as Lopez, the volume of punches he has thrown in his last two fights, along with his height and reach advantages, could prove insurmountable for Lopez.
Rey Vargas has looked unconvincing in recent fights, while we still need to see more from Nick Ball before we proclaim him the division’s No. 1. Ball (20-0-1, 11 KOs) captured the WBA featherweight title with a split decision win over Raymond Ford in June. That triumph followed a controversial draw versus Vargas for the WBC title in March. But Espinoza would tower above 5-foot-2 Ball.
Vargas was disappointing versus Ball and has not won in nearly two years, so it is hard to present an argument for him in his current form.
Lopez (30-2, 17 KOs) is the current ESPN No. 1 at featherweight after stopping Reiya Abe in eight rounds in a third defense of the IBF belt in March. Lopez has overcome big challenges in title fights, like boxing in a champion’s hometown and getting cut early (vs. Josh Warrington), and if he wins on Saturday against Angelo Leo, he may perhaps face his biggest challenge yet in a title unification fight against Espinoza to crown the best fighter in the division. — Parkinson
Real. As good as Dubois’ revival has been just a year after being stopped by Oleksandr Usyk, recent form suggests his first IBF heavyweight title defense will end in a KO defeat to Joshua.
Joshua (28-3, 25 KOs) is in top form, more so than any other heavyweight. Like Dubois (21-2, 20 KOs), Joshua has had to rebuild his career, after suffering back-to-back decision losses to Usyk in 2021 and 2022. Joshua fought cautiously, with a unanimous decision win over Jermaine Franklin in April 2023, but in his last three fights, he finished off Robert Helenius, Otto Wallin and Francis Ngannou.
Dubois returned from Saudi Arabia to London as IBF interim heavyweight champion after he stopped Filip Hrgovic in Round 8. Usyk then relinquished the IBF belt, which meant Dubois was upgraded to full champion, and so presents Joshua with the opportunity to become a three-time world champ at Wembley Stadium in London.
Joshua will try to exploit what Hrgovic had repeated success with against Dubois. Hrgovic continually landed right hands on Dubois in the early rounds, and Joshua has shown in recent fights how damaging his right hands are after he destroyed Ngannou in Round 2. Joshua landed a right hand on the former UFC heavyweight champion’s chin to knock him out cold. Joshua will seize the opportunity if Dubois makes himself similarly available, as he did against Hrgovic. Joshua is a bigger puncher than Hrgovic and, although Dubois showed durability to absorb punches in June, he has been stopped twice (by Joe Joyce in 2020 and Usyk last year) and was floored three times in the first round by Kevin Lerena before recovering to win in Round 3.
But it is no walk in the park for Joshua, who also needs to respect Dubois’ power. Dubois made a mess of Hrgovic’s face and can potentially pull off a shock stoppage against Joshua, just like Andy Ruiz Jr. did in 2019. But Joshua, who ruled as champion from 2016 to 2019 and then from 2019 to 2021, is more likely to win this fight by KO. — Parkinson