This Weekend’s Fight Cards
Friday 12/15 - DAZN 7pm Saturday 12/16 - Showtime 8pm Saturday 12/16 - DAZN 7pm
Cruiserweight Non-Title Fight
 Super Middleweight 
 IBF/WBO Unified Flyweight Titles
Jake Paul vs. Andre August
 David Morrell vs. Sena Agbeko
 Bam Rodriguez vs. Sunny Edwards

Women's WBC World Super Middleweight Title WBC World Flyweight Title
 Super Bantamweight
Shadasia Green vs. Franchon Crews Dezurn Julio Caesar Martinez vs. Angelino Cordova
 Murodjon Akhmadaliev vs. Kevin Gonzalez

Lightweight
 Flyweight
Chris Colbert vs. Jose Valenzuela Galal Yafai vs. Rocco Santomauro

Bam Rodriguez vs. Sunny Edwards 

IBF & WBO Unified Flyweight Title Fight

DAZN - Arizona - Start Time: 7pm; Main Event: 10pm

Hype for this Card -  7/10 The main event is an amazing fight and a rarity in today’s boxing landscape. Two young undefeated champs in their prime going for it and daring to be great. However, this card overall is very topheavy. There are a few other interesting fighters in Murodjon Akhmadaliev and Galal Yafai, but nothing I would consider “must watch”.

Main Event - Flyweight 115 pounds                                                      

IBF & WBO Unified Flyweight Title

Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez  #1 (18-0-0) -192

vs.

Sunny Edwards #2 (20-0-0) +174

What’s at Stake

Not only are two of the four Flyweight belts on the line here, but Sunny and Bam are widely considered #1 and #2 in the division.  After Saturday night we’re going to know who the king at Flyweight is. Each guy is trying to protect an undefeated record as well. 

Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez

Bam burst onto the worldwide stage in 2022, taking a fight against legend Carlos Burgos on short notice for the vacant WBC Super Flyweight belt. He earned a decisive unanimous decision and followed that up with a TKO victory against the guy he filled in for, another legend in Srisaket Sor Rungvisai. Since then, Bam has moved back down to Flyweight, his more natural weight class. 

In the ring, Bam is an exciting fighter, pushing the pace and utilizing his power while still staying responsible defensively through his footwork. He’s also shown he has a lot of heart, winning his current WBO belt after getting a broken jaw half way through. 

Sunny Edwards

A UK fighter out of London, Edwards is making his 5th defense of the IBF belt. He’s comfortably beaten everyone in his path by decision and that’s where the difference between him and Bam lies. Where Bam is much more aggressive, Edward has made his name as a slick boxer. Constantly moving around the ring, he uses his speed and agility to prevent his opponents from hitting him cleanly if at all. He’s able to land just enough punches to score points, but never really commits enough to threaten knocking anyone out. Overall an effective strategy that’s served him well, but it means he probably won’t be known by anyone outside the most dedicated boxing fans. 

Pick to Win

This is as close to a 50/50 fight as you’re going to see in my opinion. The only way I see it ending is a decision and that’s all on Sunny Edwards. He probably won’t be willing to put himself in a situation where he can take sustained punishment from Bam. The question will be if Bam is skilled enough to knock Sunny off his game through being aggressive, because if he just sits back and waits for counters, Sunny is going to bank rounds and win on points.  I think Bam is the power and skill combo that Sunny has never come across, so I’ll give this one to Bam Rodriguez. If I were to bet though, there isn’t a ton on of value in that, so I’d probably take Bam by KO on the off chance he can connect a home run shot.

Bam Rodriguez by Split Decision. 



Undercard

Murodjon Akhmadaliev vs. Kevin Gonzalez - Super Bantam

Murodjon is a former 2 belt unified Super Bantam champion that is coming off of a right decision loss to Marlon Tapales. He’s a aggressive guy with knockout power and has already fought in 5 championship fights so I’d expect him to beat the smaller more inexperienced Gonzalez. One interesting note about the belts Murodjon lost to Tapales. Tapales is now putting those on the line against The Monster Naoya Inoue December 26th with the winner becoming undisputed at Super Bantamweight. I feel like Murodjon would have been a slightly tougher challenge, but would have been KO’d the same as what we’ll se happen to Tapales. 


Galal Yafai vs. Rocco Santomauro - Flyweight

Yafai is an interesting up and comer to the Flyweight division. He’s only 5 fights into his pro career, but he’s already won an olympic gold as an amateur. He’s on the fast track to challenge for the WBC belt, which I would expect to happen sometime in 2024 or 2025 depending on current status of champion Julio Caesar Martinez. As far as this fight, Yafai should win easily. Santomauro is going to be overmatched. He’s coming off a loss in June and of his last 5 wins before that, only 2 opponents had a winning record, one didn’t even have a win on his record at all.

Jake Paul vs. Andre August 

Non-Title Cruiserweight Main Event

DAZN - Orlando Florida- Start Time: 7pm; Main Event: 10pm

Jake Paul (7-1) 26 from Ohio #154 at Cruiserweight 

Andre August (10-1-1) 35 from Texas #304 at Cruiserweight

Jake Paul, Internet celebrity turned boxer, has had a unique start to his career. His previous 8 fights have almost exclusively been against retired UFC guys, a basketball player and a fellow youtuber. His lone fight against an actual boxer in Tommy Fury was a loss, but some would say that even Fury is more internet personality than boxer. A lot of people discredit Paul’s resume because of this. To be honest though, no one outside of the most accomplished amateurs fight any serious competition in their first few fights anyway. 

Paul decided to flip the script and fight a boxer with basically zero reputation in Andre August. Not much is known about this guy, but digging into it, you’ll see it was a very calculated choice by Jake Paul’s team. First off, August is a 35 year old on the back nine of his career. Second, he’s only fought once in the last 4 years, so the inactivity is going to work in Paul’s favor. Third, of August’s 10 wins he’s only knocked out 5, so the power won’t be very much of a threat.  Finally, this is an 8 round fight. August has never fought more than 6. Combine all these and the deck is stacked in Jake Pauls’s favor. 

As far as Paul goes, he is actually committed to boxing training by all accounts. He puts in the time at the gym and is not bad at all for a guy that started the sport at 21. He says that he wants to be a champion, that might not be in the cards though. I think he’s good enough to beat some low level guys and most any older MMA guy because Paul does have athleticism and power on his side. However his footwork and defense leave him exposed. Any competent Cruiserweight would exploit those weaknesses and eat him alive.  

Prediction: Jake Paul by KO. 

Other Fights on this Card to Watch

  • Shadasia Green vs. Franchon Crews Dezurn - Vacant Women’s WBC Super Middleweight Championship

    • Crews Dezurn, former undisputed Super Middleweight titleholder is attempting to be a two time champion after losing all her belts to Savannah Marshall in July. Since then, Marshall dropped the WBC belt and Crews Dezurn can now get it right back. 

David Morrell vs. Sena Agbeko 

Super Middleweight Non-Title Fight

DAZN - Arizona - Start Time: 7pm; Main Event: 10pm

Hype for this Card -  6/10 This is somewhat of a sad card as this will be Showtime’s final boxing event ever. They’ve decided to not renew their relationship with promoter, Premier Boxing Champions (PBC). PBC will begin airing fights on Amazon Prime starting in 2024. 

With that out of the way, we have a showcase for David Morell, a “boogeyman” at Super Middleweight looking to force a fight against top guys like Canelo and David Benavidez. The co-main event is a Flyweight Title fight. Julio Caesar Martinez is defending his belt against Jose Valenzuela.

Main Event - Super Middleweight 168 pounds                                                       WBA World Super Middleweight Title (Canelo Alvarez is the WBA Super World Champion)

David Morrell  #10 (9-0-0) 

vs.

Sena Agbeko #32 (28-2-0) 

What’s at Stake

This fight is all about David Morrell.  Coming from Cuba, he had a pretty ridiculous amateur record of 130-2 before defecting to the US in 2019. Since then, he’s been on a tear, KOing anyone in his way. Plus, he literally put one of his last opponents into a coma. This puts him in a tough spot. He’s dangerous enough to beat anyone in the division and win a championship. On the other hand, that’s exactly why the guy with the belts, Canelo, wouldn’t want to risk a fight with him. This is just going to be a keep busy fight with a potentially brutal Knock Out of Agbeko. 

Co-Main Event - Flyweight 112 pounds                                                      

WBC World Flyweight Title 

Julio Caesar Martinez  #11 (20-2-0) 

vs.

Angelino Cordova #32 (18-0-1)

What’s at Stake

On paper Julio Caesar Martinez should win this one and retain his belt easily. He’s been the WBC Flyweight titleholder since 2019 and among the longest tenured titleholders behind Artur Beterbiev and Arsen Goulamirian. Angelino Crodova on the other hand has had a really weird career that has led him to this fight. He’s won his last two against credible opponents, but before that. Wow. He fought 4 guys in a row with a combined record of 0-14. I don’t think he has much of a chance, but I said the same thing about Rafael Espinoza against Robeisy Ramirez last week and that was a fight of the year candidate.


MMA and other Combat Sports

UFC 296 - 9pm Main Card - 7pm Prelims - 5pm Early Prelims

Leon Edwards vs. Colby Covington

Alexandre Pantoja vs. Brandon Royal

Shavkat Rakhmonov vs. Stephen Thompson

Tony Ferguson vs. Paddy Pimblett

Vincente Luque vs. Ian Garry