Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis needs to ensure he’s not kept out of the loop for his negotiations for a mega-fight against Teofimo Lopez in early 2025. Ennis (33-0, 29 KOs) felt he was blindsided about being offered a fight against Vergil Ortiz Jr. on February 22nd.
The “Out Of The Loop” Excuse
This time, IBF welterweight champion Ennis (33-0, 29 KOs) must be involved because a match against Teofimo (21-1, 13 KOs) will boost his slowly progressing career.
Fans already don’t believe Boots’ excuse for choosing not to fight Vergil, viewing it as a case of old-fashioned fear. His last opponent, Karen Chukhadzhian, humiliated him on November 9th, and Ortiz Jr. could do much worse to him. Ennis’ excuse about being kept out of the loop with his team has fallen flat with fans, who see him as lacking courage after what happened to him against Karen.
Lopez shows he’s unafraid to take the challenge of moving up to 147. It looks bad that Ennis wasn’t willing to do the same thing by going up to 154 for one fight to challenge Vergil Jr. for his WBC interim title on His Excellency Turki Alalshikh’s show in Riyadh on February 22nd.
Teofimo started his career at lightweight and moved up to 140 in 2022. Teo’s only had five fights at light welterweight, and now he’s making the jump 147 to challenge Boots. That’s impressive.
The downside of Ennis taking this fight against Lopez is that if he gets beaten or struggles to win, his stock will drop even further than it is right now after his decision not to take the Vergil Jr. contest. It would be difficult to see Boots come back from a loss or poor showing against Teofimo and become a popular guy.
Proving Doubters Wrong
Lance Pugmire reports that Teofimo’s promoter, Bob Arum, is negotiating with Matchroom boss Eddie Hearn to schedule the fight for a joint DAZN/ESPN PPV event early next year. Now that Terence Crawford has moved up in weight, it’s the best fight that can be made for Boots at 147.
We must wait and see if this fight gets made because it still needs to be negotiated. Teofimo might choose to play A-side with Ennis, which will sink any chances of the match. Boots sees himself as the King of the 147-lb division, which he is now in terms of talent. Conor Benn, Devin Haney, and Ryan Garcia are more popular than Ennis because they have personalities.
Ennis wants to be a star, but he cannot do that unless he negotiates the Teofimo fight and faces Haney, Ryan, and Benn.
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