Earlier today Hideyuki Ohashi, arguably the busiest man in boxing at the moment, held a press conference to announce "Lemino BOXING Phoenix Battle 122", which is set for September 25th at Korakuen Hall.
The show which features Ohashi and Mexican legend Ricardo “Finito” Lopez on the poster, is set to be a festival of the Minimumweight division with Lopez being honoured as a guest at the show as a living legend of the division, and possibly the division’s greatest ever fighter. Lopez is also a man who beat Ohashi, with Lopez actually dethroning Ohashi in 1990 to begin his legendary reign as the WBC Minimumweight champion, which saw him run up 21 defenses in around 9 years. The meeting between the two former world champions will be the first time they’ve met in 10 years and a ceremony will be held for the two men at the event. Ohashi did mention that he’d been asked about having an exhibition with Lopez, but declined, citing the fact he hasn’t been exercising in 30 years, but was excited to have a chat with the legendary Mexican. Notably the last time they were together was at the WBC General Assembly in 2014. Ohashi also explained that Undisputed Super Bantamweight champion
Naoya Inoue (27-0, 24) [井上尚弥] would also be in attendance.
The show had 3 bouts announced today, including 2 title bouts and a title eliminator.
One of the title bouts will see Japanese Youth champion
Rento Miyazawa (7-2-1, 2) [宮澤漣斗] defending his belt for the first time, taking on
Takero Kitano(6-0-1, 3) [北野武郎]. Miyazawa stated that he was going to fight as if he was the challenger, and promised to show his improvement since winning the title, whilst Kitano promised to make it into a war.
The one non-title bout will be a Japanese title eliminator between
Katsuki Mori (12-3, 3) [森且貴] and
Ryusei Matsumoto (3-0, 1) [松本流星]. Of the two men Mori is the more established, at least as a professional, having won the All Japan
Rookie of the Year in 2019 and the Japanese Youth title in 2022, and twice fighting for the Japanese title. Despite his significant edge in professional experience Mori is probably the under-dog here, with Matsumoto being a stellar amateur with close to 100 amateur bouts and over 70 wins. At the event today Moru spoke about winning to secure his third title shot, but was aware of Matsumoto's amateur pedigree. Matsumoto on the other hand, who scored a very good win over Jomar Caindog back in February, explained he was focused on training for the bout.
The main event of the card is a bout for the OPBF Minimumweight title, as
Takeshi Ishii (8-1, 7) [石井武志] takes on Filipino
John Kevin Jimenez (8-0, 3), for the vacant title. Jimenez didn’t travel over for the event, though Ishii was there and explained that he was honoured to have got this opportunity and to get his first title fight. He added that he was disappointed when he lost last year, losing a decision to Lito Dante, and was going to fight this bout as if it was his last chance, despite the fact he’s only 24 and has a lot of time to rebuild if he does suffer another set back.
