Tim Tszyu says there’s no hurry for him and WBC interim junior middleweight champion Vergil Ortiz Jr. to fight. The two fighters were supposed to fight on August 3rd in a Riyadh Season event, but Tszyu had to cancel the fight because his cut from his previous fight wasn’t healed.
(Credit: Joseph Correa/Premier Boxing Champions)
This week, Tszyu had expressed interest in rescheduling against the unbeaten Ortiz Jr. (22-0, 21 KOs). However, in an interview today, Tszyu changed his mind, saying there’s no “big rush” to fight the 26-year-old Vergil Jr.
Vergil Jr. recently captured the WBC interim 154-lb title in a questionable 12-round majority decision win over Serhii Bohachuk on August 10th in Las Vegas. It was a close fight that easily could have gone the other way.
Indeed, many fans viewed Bohachuk as deserving of the win, and they were troubled when Ortiz Jr. chose not to give him a rematch to clear up the controversy. The scores were 114-112, 114-112 for Vergil Jr. and 113-113.
After the controversy over that fight, it’s not surprising that Tszyu isn’t in a hurry to fight Ortiz Jr. and potentially find himself in the same position. He would likely be the B-side, even if he came into the fight with the IBF belt in his possession.
Tszyu (24-1, 17 KOs) will challenge IBF junior middleweight champion Bakhram Murtazaliev this Saturday, October 19th, at the Caribe Royale Resort in Orlando, Florida. If Tszyu wins that fight, he’ll have a valuable chess piece to interest Terence Crawford or Errol Spence. Those would be much bigger money fights than a clash against Vergil Ortiz Jr.
“I don’t really know, in all honesty. Right now, I’ve got a plan. There are heaps of him. Me and him are young. There’s not such a big rush to make it happen now,” said Tim Tszyu to Fight Hub TV when asked about whether he’d like to reschedule the fight with Vergil Ortiz Jr. “We’ve still got heaps of time left.”
It’s understandable why Tszyu, 29, wouldn’t want to fight Vergil right now. That would be a tough fight for him, and it wouldn’t bring in the money that some of the other fights would. Tszyu is interested in these fights:
– Terence Crawford
– Canelo Alvarez
– Errol Spence
– Sebastian Fundora
It’s unknown whether Crawford would be interested in fighting Tszyu in a unification match, because he was trading message on social media this week against Conor McGregor.
“As soon as I get a fight offered, there’s no question, ‘Yes.’ I don’t need to watch tapes and think about it. Straightaway, ‘Yes.’ It just so happens that the cut was still healing,” said Tszyu about his canceled fight on August 3rd against Vergil Ortiz Jr.
“As soon as I accepted the fight, it was a couple of days after I got my stitches out. So it was still fresh. As soon as I came back from a little training camp with my dad, it was still not ready to go. These days, when you’re at this level, you’ve got to be 100%. There’s no such thing as taking a short corner and rushing things and not doing things professionally,” said Tszyu about why his fight against Vergil Ortiz Jr. failed to happen.
If Tszyu and Ortiz Jr. keep winning, they’ll eventually meet up down the road. However, it’s questionable whether we’ll see that fight happen in the next two years because there are a lot of other more compelling matchups for both.
“I’m happy in the position I’m at. What do I need to do? Everything is good at this stage. If there’s big fights to be made, then yeah, we’ll start talking and consider it,” said Tszyu when asked if he’d be interested in fighting on the Riyadh Season cards. “Right now, I’ve got all the fights in front of me. So, we’ll see how it goes.
“Yeah, 100%. I’ve basically moved here,” said Tszyu, when asked if he’d like all the big fights against Errol Spence, Sebastian Fundora and Terence Crawford to happen in the U.S. “I’m living in a house here. I’ve been here for the last three and a half months. I’m basically in America here to live my dream.”
Spence is supposed to be fighting Fundora next, and he’s not likely to win that fight. If Spence wins, a rematch between him and Crawford would be more realistic than a clash against Tszyu. A fight between Spence and Tszyu would be entertaining if it happens because both guys are huge punchers.
“It would be cracking,” said Tszyu when asked what a fight between him and Crawford would look like. “They say, ‘Styles make fights.’ It would be one hell of a show, that one. I think he did well,” said Tszyu about Crawford’s performance in his debut at 154 against WBA junior middleweight champion Israil Madrimov on August 3rd.
Crawford (41-0, 31 KOs) is focusing on getting the biggest money fights possible, and he’s not likely to agree to a match against Tszyu. He wants the PPV-level fighters or ones that have belts.
“Critics are always going to be like that, but I think he did well. Madrimov is not a bum. People have to understand. 154 is a different division from 147. That’s another thing. The boxing dynamic changes in three months and six months.
“There’s a new winner; there’s a new loser. There are entertaining fights, and some people’s stock goes up, and some people’s stock goes down,” said Tszyu when asked who he wants to fight in 2025.
Tszyu is quiet about who he wants to fight next year, but he wants to fight Crawford, Spence, or Canelo. If he can’t get any of those fighters, he’ll shoot for a fight against Fundora if he still holds the WBC and WBO 154-lb belts.
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