In 13 days, Vergil Ortiz Jr. will challenge WBC interim junior middleweight champion Serhii Bohachuk on August 10 at the Michelob ULTRA Arena at Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino in Las Vegas. The two fighters will headline the card, which begins at 5:00 p.m. ET and will be live on DAZN.
Bohachuk’s Impressive Rise
It’s difficult to predict the winner of Ortiz vs. Bohachuk because both have looked impressive recently. Bohachuk, 29, is coming off a better win. He beat Brian Mendoza to capture his WBC interim junior middleweight title on March 30th at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
In contrast, Vergil has a couple of wins over journeymen Fredrick Lawson and Thomas Dulorme, who are nowhere near top-level fighters.
Ortiz Jr. (21-0, 21 KOs) sounds confident that he’ll defeat Bohachuk (24-1, 23 KOs) and then fight for the world title against the winner of the match between WBC 154-lb champion Sebastian Fundora and Errol Spence.
“I wanted to fight against him because I wanted to face against the best. That’s my goal. I want to be the best,” said Serhii Bohachuk to Golden Boy Boxing about why he wanted to fight Vergil Ortiz Jr. on August 10th.
If Bohachuk’s goal is to become popular rapidly, fighting Vergil Ortiz is the way to go. If he’s victorious against Ortiz Jr., especially if he knocks him out or dominates, he’ll get a lot of attention from fans.
“I sparred with him before, but sparring is sparring. You’re learning. The fight is different. I know this guy. He’s strong, smart, and has a good punch,” Bohachuk said about Ortiz Jr. “He has good conditioning. He’s a good fighter, but I’m better.”
Bohachuk doesn’t say when he sparred with Vergil. It won’t mean much if the sparring occurred years ago, and it sounds like it did. Ortiz Jr. is 26 now and has fought only twice in the last two years due to his medical problems. He’s changed a lot and gotten older without fighting high-level opposition.
Bohachuk’s Game Plan
“I want to show my fans a good fight. I’m not interested in easy boxers,” said Bohachuk. “It’s not interesting for me, and for people. It’s my goal to show my friends and people a good fight. I think it’s going to be the best fight of the year, because I know Vergil. He’s strong, and I’m strong. It’s not a fight. It’s war in the ring.”
Bohachuk is lucky to get this fight because many fighters would want to avoid him after what he did to Brian Mendoza. If he’s victorious against Ortiz, it would be great if Bohachuk could continue to get interesting fights, but that’s not likely to be the case.
“I know his style before, but he’s changed. He has more skills,” said Bohachuk about Vergil Jr. “Now he understands he needs to be ready for this fight 100%. I’m strong too. The last time I sparred him, I was in good shape, but now I need to be better because he knows me. He changed. I think he can be faster for this fight. It won’t more power punches. He’ll be smarter,” said Bohachuk.
I don’t think Vergil Jr. has changed. He’s just gotten bigger now that he’s fighting at 154, as he’s not killing himself to make weight anymore now that he’s no longer fighting at 147. He should have moved up to 154 long ago because he was way too big for the welterweight division.
It’s understandable why Vergil Jr. stayed at welterweight as long as he did because that’s where the money fights were. He wanted to fight Terence Crawford, Errol Spence, and Shawn Porter. Unfortunately, health problems prevented him from staying healthy long enough to get any of those fights.
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