Errol Spence Jr. is seemingly set to take on Sebastian Fundora in January for the WBO and WBC super welterweight titles.
Golden Boy Promotion’s Oscar De La Hoya has plans to offer Spence a second fight in 2025 against one of his top fighters, Vergil Ortiz Jr., at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
De La Hoya took to social media on Sunday night to pitch the idea, tagging both fighters.
Spence had a peculiar and possibly cryptic response. He pulled a similar post from De La Hoya from 2022 when he tried to make the same fight. Spence quoted and reposted with the response, “chill bro bro.”
Spence later deleted the tweet and followed it up with this response.
In any case, there is no doubt Spence is aware of De La Hoya’s efforts to find a big fight for Ortiz. The fight makes all the sense in the world.
Ortiz is currently the interim WBC champion, so it would make sense for him to fight the winner of Spence-Fundora. You could argue Ortiz deserves the first crack at Fundora because of his interim title status.
As it is, a fight with the Spence is a much bigger attraction for boxing and payday for Fundora. If Spence faces Fundora as planned and wins–which is not a foregone conclusion–the question is: should Ortiz take a fight in the meantime?
A fight against someone like Erickson Lubin would make sense for Ortiz, though that’s a tough matchup against a veteran who has proven to be a tough out for almost everyone he’s faced. In many ways, the road for both Spence and Ortiz could lead to Terence Crawford.
The pound-for-pound legend had to agree to step aside to allow Spence and Fundora to make their fight in January.
Crawford was mandatory for Fundora, but he worked out a deal with the latter to allow him to make a voluntary title defense against Spence.
The biggest money fight for anyone in or around the 154-pound division is with Crawford. Spence had a shot at Crawford but lost via ninth-round TKO in 2023.
He had an opportunity to rematch him but allowed the timetable on the agreement for the second fight to expire.
In an interview before his August clash with Israil Madrimov, Crawford told me that the rematch with Spence was still possible.
However, after defeating Madrimov, Crawford shifted gears and said the door was closed. As you can see, things can change.
If Spence faces Fundora and wins two titles in Crawford’s division, he will have made himself a more attractive fight for his rival in a rematch. At that point, perhaps the two could climb back into the ring for a second meeting.
If Fundora defeats Spence, he may not get an immediate shot at Crawford. It would then make a lot more sense for Fundora to fight Ortiz, and the winner would have every right to hunt a fight with Crawford–if he hasn’t retired.
This post from De La Hoya might be a random late-night shot in the dark, but it seemingly has a level of sensibility, which is not always true with boxing scuttlebutt.
