Vergil Ortiz has shown that he is a player at 147, but is he ready for Terence Crawford?

Saturday was a statement day in the world of boxing. Vergil Ortiz proved he could stand alongside an established veteran and former world title in Maurice Hooker, and could continue to show the skills and strength that made him one of the brightest young stars of the box.

With a TKO in round 7, Ortiz put himself in a serious dispute and pronounced the name Terence Crawford in his media interviews after the fight.

“This victory gives me more confidence,” Ortiz said after the fight. “I now believe even more in myself that I’m ready for a world title. I would love the opportunity to fight Terence Crawford. If I get an opportunity, I’ll use it. I do not care if I’m ready not or not; I want the fight. “

Whether Ortiz is ready for ESPN’s no. 1 pound-for-pound fighter, is a matter of debate, but the results of Ortiz so far in his career are striking. With 17 knockouts in 17 fights, having never fought the seventh round, his ambitions are clear.

But Ortiz was not the only big winner on Saturday. In his 16th pro fight, Lawrence Okolie won a world cross-country championship and sent off a former champion in Krzystof Glowacki. And after more than 500 days out of the ring, Artur Beterbiev continued his winning streak in a successful defense of his WBC and IBF world titles – pushing his record to 16-0, with 16 KOs.

What do these three victories mean? Ben Baby and Nick Parkinson break everything down.

Baby: Vergil Ortiz is not quite ready for Terence Crawford – but he could be close

“Vergil is young and coming,” Maurice Hooker said shortly after his loss to Ortiz on Saturday. “But there are levels to this. He’s good. But he’s not ready for Terence Crawford. To be ready, he just has to keep building himself up. He will one day be a world champion. ‘

I have to agree with Hooker here: Ortiz is good and he’s going to be a world champion one day, but he may not be ready for Crawford yet. Hooker touched Ortiz often enough to leave a mark, and was able to make the 22-year-old rough, as he has shown that even at a loss, he is a very solid and entertaining welterweight. Give Ortiz credit for making the adjustment in the fight to get to the body, but beating someone of Crawford’s caliber requires a very special achievement.

Although the fight in the short term is not necessarily recommended, there is a way for Ortiz to get Crawford in early 2022. If boxing politics can be ironed out, Ortiz is ready for some of the welterweights on the Premier Boxing Champion umbrella. Ortiz wants a title fight in 2021, and who wants to say he is not ready for the current WBA world title Yordenis Ugas, who won three straight after a loss to Shawn Porter in March 2019. If Ortiz can win the battle , and maybe someone can turn down like Danny Garcia or even a Josesito Lopez, he needs to be more than ready (and economically viable enough) for Crawford to seriously entertain the thought of a fight.

Let us also not forget that Crawford has to get bigger names at some point. The boxing world can talk as loud as they want, about the elusive Errol Spence Jr. fight, but in the here and now, Crawford desperately needs a fight against Shawn Porter if he hopes to maximize his career earnings. Ortiz is in a hurry to build credibility, and if there’s a boxer with a name who’s actually willing to step in and fight Crawford, he’s unable to say no to a fight. which does not make sense. Crawford is also too good and too talented not to go over to a party win with some big names earning him some good pay days.

If the opportunity is too great for both fighters to pass up, there is no reason why it should not happen.

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Parkinson: Beterbiev dominated and got the necessary rounds. What should be next?

At 36 years old and with such a fan-friendly style, Beterbiev needed the big fights and spotlight without any delays. After 519 days between fights, Beterbiev showed he had lost none of his penalty on Saturday in a 10-round victory over Adam Deines. It holds Beterbiev, who holds the WBC and IBF world titles, as the no. 1 fighter in the light heavyweight division, and a unification fight is likely to take place later this year.

Perhaps the one most fans want to see – and have wanted to see for a while now – is Beterbiev against fellow Russian Dmitry Bivol (17-0, 11 KOs), who is defending his WBA version of the world title against the British light . heavyweight Craig Richards on May 1st.

But another battle for the unification of the title that is easier to make is Beterbiev against the winner of the vacant WBO title fight between New Yorker Joe Smith Jr. (26-3, 21 KOs) and Russian Maxim Vlasov (45-3, 26 KOs) on April 10th. Top Rank promotes both Smith and Beterbiev, and that makes the fight likely that Smith, who was indicated by Bivol two years ago, defeats Vlasov.

Another Russian, Sergey Kovalev (34-4-1, 29 KOs), 37, who was once a dreaded world champion and number 1 in the division, is not the force he was, has problems away from the sport and has a drug test for synthetic testosterone in January. The fight seems unlikely for Beterbiev, but former champion Jean Pascal (35-6-1) (38) is another big possibility, as both are in Canada. The chances of the last fight taking place in the next twelve months are also quite strong – Pascal is the number 1 candidate with the WBC.

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Parkinson: What is the ceiling of Lawrence Okolie after winning his first world title?

After winning his first world title in his 16th fight, Okolie’s time in the cruiserweight division is likely to be limited. He will most likely fight as a heavyweight by the time he runs out for his 20th game. How Okolie performs as a heavyweight is another matter, but after the impressive KO win against Krzystof Glowacki against former world champion Krzystof Glowacki, he expects the Londoner to move quickly to unite the world titles in cruiserweight.

Okolie has become a much more polished boxer over the past few years and he has always had a knockout power, as evidenced by Saturday’s sixth round knockout from Glowacki with a right hand to the jaw. Tougher tests await IBF world title Mairis Briedis (27-1, 19 KOs) from Latvia and WBC title holder Ilunga Makabu (28-2, 25 KOs) from the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Cruiserweight is not as competitive as the divisions above or below, and Okolie has the potential to become world cruiserweight no. 1 to become if he makes the Breidis battle a reality. With Oleksandr Usyk now in heavyweight, following his own successful unification of all four major world titles, Okolie could emerge as the next united world champion of the division.

“He’s so hard to prepare, he’s so big, he’s so impressive,” Tony Bellew (30-3-1, 20 KOs), WBC crossweight champion from 2016 to 2018, said of Okolie.