Ten months ago, Sebastian Fundora and Serhii Bohachuk were a few days away from fighting each other when a twist of fate intervened.
Bohachuk is about to find out if that twist requires the adjective cruel.
Because now that Fundora’s planned March 29 junior middleweight title defense against former three-belt welterweight champion Errol Spence Jnr has fallen through, Fundora needs a replacement opponent. And who makes better sense than Bohachuk?
In the week before WBO junior middleweight champion Tim Tszyu was due to defend his belt against former welterweight titleholder Keith Thurman, a training-camp injury forced Thurman off the card and Fundora was pulled off his scheduled undercard bout on the card to fight for both the WBO and WBC belts.
“Bohachuk did not have to step aside because we had a contract. Yet we did and allowed Fundora to fight Tim Tszyu,” Bohachuk trainer Manny Robles reminded Friday in an interview with BoxingScene.
The rest was history, as Fundora accidentally gashed Tszyu atop the head with an elbow in the second round, and the two battled through 12 violently bloody rounds before Fundora 21-1-1 (13 KOs) emerged as a unified champion by split decision.
Ukraine’s Bohachuk, 25-2 (24 KOs), took consolation by posting a unanimous decision triumph over the man who was coming off a knockout victory over Fundora, Brian Mendoza, and as Fundora turned his attention to Spence, Bohachuk raised his hand for two wars, one that materialized against Vergil Ortiz Jnr and another that vanished against former WBA titleholder Israil Madrimov.
Bohachuk knocked down Ortiz twice, but left Mandalay Bay scratching his head in a tightly contested majority decision loss. Madrimov then canceled, opting to take a showdown with Ortiz on February 22 in Saudi Arabia while Bohachuk stopped replacement foe Ishmael Davis in six rounds December 21.
When asked of Bohachuk was first in line for Fundora, a Fundora representative Thursday said he didn’t believe Bohachuk was “ready” following his bout just more than three weeks ago.
“We’ll be ready,” Robles clarified. “As soon as I received the news that Errol Spence wouldn’t be fighting, I went straight into my calendar and started counting the days. Serhii can be in the gym Monday, and that gives us 10 weeks to prepare. That’s more than enough time. Bohachuk took a little vacation after [December 21]. Monday would be perfect.”
Bohachuk promoter Tom Loeffler also immediately lobbed a call to a Premier Boxing Champions representative expressing Bohachuk’s interest in the Fundora fight that evaded him last year.
“Serhii Bohachuk would be well-suited for [Fundora]. He fought a WBC ‘Ready’ Serhii Bohachuk feels most deserving of landing Sebastian Fundora title shot eliminator in his last fight, is rated No. 2 by the WBC behind Spence. If there’s any way to make that fight happen, that’d be great. We have a lot of respect for Fundora, and that’d be a tremendous fight.”
Loeffler had Bohachuk fighting for the WBC interim belt against Mendoza, but he said there was no written agreement in place for Fundora to immediately turn back to fight Bohachuk if he became champion.
“The natural path is for them to fight, and I think when you consider what Serhii did in the past year, that would be a great fight,” Loeffler said.
With the March 29 bout now shifting from a pay-per-view to a non-pay-per-view on Amazon Prime Video expected to land at MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Fundora’s reps have discussed PBC fighter Joey Spencer, and they could also opt to keep both belts on the line against the WBO’s No. 5-ranked 154lbs Chordale Booker, another PBC fighter.
“You can’t force people to do certain things. We’ll take opportunities as they come,” Loeffler said. “Serhii’s one of those guys who will fight anyone. We’ll always look for the most exciting fights for him.”
Robles feels that Bohachuk’s original gesture to permit Fundora to pursue the title fight should be accounted for now.
“It’s boxing. You know how it is. They can tell you one thing today, and another thing tomorrow,” Robles said. “People can make promises, but if it’s not on paper, there can be a change of heart and you don’t need to keep a promise. I’m not saying this will be the case with Fundora and his promoter, Sampson Lewkowicz, who I have the utmost respect for. But we have seen it happen in different occasions.
“I know Tom is on it, and I’ve told him we have more than enough time for Serhii to be ready for the fight. He’s injury free, ready to go.”
Bohachuk is ranked No. 8 by the WBO, so both belts would be on the line.
“Being in his position should matter,” Robles said. “Why not? We were originally going to fight [Fundora] in the first place. Now, we’re available.
“If anybody deserves the chance to fight for the titles, it’s Serhii.”
Lance Pugmire is BoxingScene’s senior U.S. writer and an assistant producer for ProBox TV. Pugmire has covered boxing since the early 2000s, first at the Los Angeles Times and then at The Athletic and USA Today. He won the Boxing Writers’ Association of America’s Nat Fleischer Award in 2022 for career excellence.
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