Promoter Eddie Hearn has revealed that he’s made an offer to Top Rank to have former WBC/WBO light-welterweight champion Jose Ramirez face unbeaten 147-lb contender Conor Benn on July 9th at the O2 Arena in London.
Hearn is hopeful he can get the fight made between Ramirez (27-1, 17 KOs) and Benn (21-0, 14 KOs). It’s a risky fight for the 25-year-old Benn, who, up to this point in his six-year professional career, has been facing older fighters on their last legs and third-tier opposition.
Hearn throwing Benn in with a top-tier guy like Ramirez could backfire on him, and we could see him get beaten for the first time.
Still, this is a move that Benn must take because he wants to fight for one of the four welterweight titles once they’re fragmented at the end of the year when the winner of the Errol Spence Jr. vs. Terence Crawford undisputed fight vacates the belts to move up to 154.
If Benn can’t defeat someone Ramirez, he has hopes of beating the likes of Vergil Ortiz Jr, Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis, Keith Thurman, David Avanesyan, or Eimantas Stannionis for one of the vacated welterweight belts.
“I like the fight. It’s definitely a fight that we’re targeting,” said Eddie Hearn to iFL TV on a match between Conor Benn and Jose Ramirez on July 9th at the O2 Arena in London.
“I had a chat with Top Rank, and the Jose Ramirez fight is one that I really like [for Conor Benn]. Obviously, he wants to be paid a lot of money to come to the UK. It’s a very dangerous fight,” said Hearn about Ramirez.
Benn is coming off of a second-round knockout win over 34-year-old Chris Van Heerden on April 16th. That fight was another example of Benn being matched against an old inactive fighter that hadn’t seen action for a long, long time.
Before that, Benn beat 37-year-old Chris Algieri by a fourth-round knockout. Algieri is a commentator for DAZN but still fights occasionally.
“You’re talking about a unified light-welterweight world champion, who has moved to welterweight,” Hearn continued about the 29-year-old Ramirez. “He’s an elite fighter.
“So, I’m going to catch up to Conor Benn this week, and we’ve got to decide because we’re going on July 9th at the O2, either with Conor or another big, big fight. So if Conor doesn’t go on July 9th, he’ll go in August, and we’ll work it out.
“We’ve made an offer to Top Rank [Benn vs. Ramirez], which we’re discussing. I don’t know if we’ll get there, but it’s definitely a fight that I like.
