Kazuto Ioka-Fernando Martinez Unification Bout In Advanced Talks, Eyed For July In Tokyo
Another top-shelf junior bantamweight bout is on the horizon.
The Ring has confirmed that Kazuto Ioka and Fernando ‘Puma’ Martinez are in advanced talks for a summertime unification bout. Minor sticking points are still in place, but sources from both sides expect a deal to be reached in the coming weeks.
Once finalized, the bout will take place this July in Tokyo.
Japan’s Ioka (31-2-1, 16 knockouts), The Ring’s No. 1-rated junior bantamweight, is a four-division titlist who holds the WBA 115-pound title. Argentina’s Martinez (16-0, 9 KOs), No. 2 at 115, is the reigning IBF titlist.
Plans for the fight were further escalated once Ioka was granted approval to explore a unification bout. He was previously ordered to next face mandatory challenger John ‘Scrappy’ Ramirez (13-0, 9 KOs), who initially refused to step aside.
Those plans changed along the way, however, when the WBA hesitated to send the matter to a purse bid hearing.
Los Angeles’ Ramirez, No. 10 at 115, will instead compete for the interim WBA junior bantamweight title. He will face David Jimenez on the April 20 Devin Haney-Ryan Garcia DAZN PPV undercard in Brooklyn, New York.
Talks have taken place on and off for nearly all of 2024. Martinez was in pursuit of a unification versus both Ioka and recently crowned WBO titlist Kosei Tanaka.
Ioka also twice entered talks for a shot at Ring champ and WBC titlist Juan Francisco Estrada (44-3, 28 KOs). They were in talks for last New Year’s Eve and again earlier this year. Both rounds ended with a gulf in financial terms.
Estrada will defend his crown versus former two-division titlist Jesse ‘Bam’ Rodriguez (19-0, 12 KOs) on June 29 in Phoenix, Arizona. Rodriguez, No. 1 at 112 and No. 10 pound-for-pound, moves back to 115 after he unified the IBF and WBO titles at flyweight.
Martinez has not fought since an eleventh-round knockout of Jade Bornea last June 24 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The win was his third straight versus a Filipino and with the IBF 115-pound title at stake. Martinez dethroned Jerwin Ancajas for the belt in February 2022 and soundly outpointed him in their October 2022 rematch.
The pending fight versus Ioka will mark the first career fight in Asia for Martinez.
Ioka defended his WBA 115-pound title in a seventh-round knockout of Venezuela’s Josber Perez last New Year’s Eve. The bout took place at Tokyo’s Ota-City General Gymnasium, which has housed Ioka’s last eight starts.
Included in that batch was his WBA title win over San Antonio’s Joshua Franco in their rematch last June 24.
Ioka won via unanimous decision, though it came at a cost. He and Franco (18-2-3, 8 KOs) fought to a draw in their December 2022 WBA/WBO unification bout. Ioka was then ordered to face countryman and mandatory challenger Junto Nakatani (27-0, 20 KOs), now No. 1 at 118.
A rematch with Franco proved financially worth the decision to vacate the WBO belt he’d held since June 2019.
The universe rewarded him with another shot to unify at least two 115-pound belts, though without history at stake. Had Ioka defeated Franco in their first fight, he would have become Japan’s first-ever fighter to unify titles in at least two weight divisions. Ioka previously held the WBA and WBC strawweight titles.
Naoya Inoue (26-0, 23 KOs) beat him to the punch last summer. The Ring’s No. 2 pound-for-pound fighter dethroned WBC/WBO 122-pound titlist Stephen Fulton via eighth-round stoppage last July 25. The win saw Inoue win his fourth divisional title and second unified reign. He moved up to 122 after he fully unified the bantamweight division.
Ioka now has the chance to become the second fighter to accomplish that feat. He is already Japan’s first-ever four-division titlist, having reigned at 105, 108, 112 and 115.
Jake Donovan is a senior writer for The Ring and vice president of the Boxing Writers Association of America.
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