Lester Martinez continues his march towards the upper echelon of the super middleweight division.
Martinez, rated at No. 8 by The Ring at 168 pounds, will face Joeshon James on September 11, Chris Glover of ProBox TV told The Ring on Wednesday morning. The 10-round bout will take place at the Whitesands (also known as the ProBox TV) Events Center in Plant City, Florida and will stream live on the ProBox TV application and YouTube page.
“No one wants to fight Lester Martinez. It’s as simple as that,” Glover told The Ring. “For me, he’s ready for (Christian) Mbilli, he’s ready for (Diego) Pacheco, he’s ready for (Erik) Bazinyan. He’ll fight any of these kids, but no one wants to fight him. Joeshon James is stepping up. He’s got more balls than all these other fighters do. Joeshon James is a game kid. I have a lot of respect for him, but Lester Martinez is world class and he’s a future champion of the world.”
In his last bout on June 28, Martinez (18-0, 15 knockouts) scored an impressive unanimous decision victory over Carlos Gongora. It was a one-sided victory for Martinez over a top contender in Gongora, who fought Mbilli to a close decision loss.
On February 23, in his hometown of Guatemala City, Guatemala, Martinez dropped journeyman Ruben Angulo once en route to a second round knockout victory in a stay-busy fight.
The 28-year-old is co-trained by Brian ‘Bomac’ McIntyre, Esau Dieguez, and Red Spikes, all of whom also co-train newly-crowned WBA world junior middleweight titleholder Terence Crawford.
Martinez and Crawford generated a buzz several weeks ago after a photo of them sparring each other in a Las Vegas gym made the rounds of social media. Crawford wanted to spar Martinez in anticipation of an opportunity to fight Ring super middleweight champion Canelo Alvarez.
Prior to the handful of fights under the ProBox TV banner, Martinez did stop once-beaten Isaiah Steen on April 10 of last year.
James (9-0-2, 5 KOs), who resides in Sacramento, California, defeated Vaughn Alexander by unanimous decision in his last bout on February 16. In his previous fight on October 21, James stopped David Stevens in the opening round of a clash between unbeaten prospects.
The 26-year-old went through a stretch of fighting four consecutive fighters with unbeaten records, culminating in the knockout win over Stevens. James scored a knockout win over Richard Brewart, Jr. in September 2022 and a split-decision draw against Javier Martinez almost eight months later.
James has faced a total of six unbeaten fighters thus far in his career.
Francisco A. Salazar has written for The Ring since October 2013 and has covered boxing in Southern California and abroad since 2000. Francisco also covers boxing for the Ventura County (California) Star newspaper. He can be reached at santio89@yahoo.com
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