Sam Goodman was injured training for his fight with Naoya Inoue, and probably won’t fight on Dec. 24.
Ben Damon of FOX Sports Australia had this on X, including a photo of the cut:
Disaster. Sam Goodman has been cut over the eye in his final spar before the undisputed fight with Naoya Inoue. Goodman camp now pushing for a delay to scheduled Christmas Eve fight in Tokyo. Goodman was set to fly out tomorrow #InoueGoodman pic.twitter.com/cdq6UpIMI8
— Ben Damon (@ben_damon) December 14, 2024
While that cut isn’t, like, massive or anything, it’s definitely enough that you wouldn’t go into a fight against Naoya Inoue in 11 days sporting it, especially when you’re a mandatory challenger and will get your shot eventually. It’s just not worth risking, you’re already up against it as a massive underdog against Inoue.
If Goodman (19-0, 8 KO) does get the postponement expect, it remains to be seen if Inoue (28-0, 25 KO) will still fight in 11 days. In theory, if there’s someone within one of the top 15s in any of the sanctioning bodies close enough to on-weight and willing to step in, Inoue shouldn’t actually have that much trouble finding an opponent, and it’s an overall strong card in Tokyo, too, with Yoshiki Takei also defending his WBO bantamweight title, among other bouts.
There is, for what it’s worth, a Japanese super bantamweight title fight set for the card between Toshiki Shimomachi (19-1-3, 12 KO) and Misaki Hirano (11-1, 4 KO), and Shimomachi might be doable to step up to the main event. He’s ranked No. 8 in the world by BoxRec, which doesn’t mean the world or anything, but isn’t nothing.
Maybe worth noting that 44-year-old Guillermo Rigondeaux just fought a month ago and that only lasted a minute and 46 seconds. Rigondeaux is known to stay in good shape between fights and, well, he’s Rigondeaux, and he’s 44. Just a thought.
