Photo credit: Fumihiro Hirota / LA Boxing Gym
LOS ANGELES – Junto Nakatani will defend his WBC 118-pound title for a second time against Petch Sor Chitpattana as the last leg of a two-day Tokyo card featuring a combined seven title fights on ESPN+ on October 14.
A much more meaningful master plan, however, could be there for the taking for Nakatani should the three-division world champion remain undefeated.
Nakatani (28-0, 21 KOs) co-promoter Top Rank plans to pit the power-punching Japanese southpaw on the undercard of a Naoya Inoue showcase event in the United States next year followed by a super fight between Inoue and Nakatani at the Tokyo Dome in Japan.
The undisputed junior featherweight champion Inoue has indicated that Nakatani should first fight his younger brother Takuma Inoue (20-1, 5 KOs), a bantamweight contender and former 118-pound titlist, before he considers moving up in weight to fight him.
Nakatani agrees with the idea.
“I’m going to do what I have to do for now,” Nakatani told BoxingScene through a translator after a recent training session at the LA Boxing Gym. “If there is a chance, I will. I would like first to fight his brother Takuma and then Naoya.”
The 26-year-old Nakatani believes a fight against the elder, more dominant Naoya, 31, will be the biggest fight in Japanese history.
“TJ Doheny was a high-class opponent in his last fight and Naoya still knocked him out, so we have to give him credit,” said Nakatani. “We’re going to try to make that fight happen.”
Nakatani – No. 10 on BoxingScene’s pound-for-pound list – said he considers the four-division champion Inoue the No. 1 P4P fighter in the world.
Nakatani, who is trained by career-long coach Rudy Hernandez in Los Angeles, plans on sticking around at 118 pounds to unify titles in the division and move up to 122 pounds sometime next year once the Inoue fight becomes available.
His ultimate plan is to become a six-division champion by winning additional titles at 122, 126 and 130 pounds. He would even welcome a bout against Jesse Rodriguez in the interim if “Bam” decided to move up to 118 pounds.
But before the mouthwatering matchups can materialize, Nakatani must first step past Sor Chitpattana (76-1, 53 KOs), a 30-year-old southpaw who has fought just once outside of his native Thailand, suffering a unanimous decision loss to Takuma Inoue in 2018 for the WBC interim bantamweight title.
“Sor Chitpattana is a good contender but I’m focused on training and what I am doing,” said Nakatani. “I feel stronger at 118 pounds since I don’t have to cut the extra weight. My speed helps trigger knockouts.”
Manouk Akopyan is a sports journalist, writer and broadcast reporter whose work has appeared on ESPN, Fox Sports, USA Today, The Guardian, Newsweek, Men’s Health, NFL.com, Los Angeles Times, Philadelphia Inquirer, Ring Magazine and more. He has been writing for BoxingScene since 2018. Manouk is a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America and the MMA Journalists Association. He can be reached on X (formerly Twitter), Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube, through email at manouk[dot]akopyan[at]gmail.com or via www.ManoukAkopyan.com.
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