Josh Taylor Gives Up WBC Title to Pursue Jack Catterall Rematch
The WBC has just announced that unified super lightweight champion Josh “Tartan Tornado” Taylor (19-0, 13 KO’s) has formally relinquished their title. Taylor has done this so that he can pursue a rematch with Jack “El Gato” Catterall (26-1, 13 KO’s) minus any red tape. Catterall lost a controversial split decision loss to the Tartan Tornado on February 26.
It was controversial because most who saw the bout felt as though El Gato was the clear victor over the then undisputed champion. Since then, Taylor has been a little all over the place when it came to the notion of facing Catterall again. At times, he said he would fight him but he’s also said he didn’t need to at others. More recently, Taylor stated that he would face Catterall next but was being sidetracked by a mandatory fight against Jose “Chon” Zepeda (35-2, 27 KO’s).
This was rather strange given that he had already surrendered his WBA title. Plus, he claimed the only reason he was remaining in the division was to rematch Catterall. Now that Taylor has dropped the WBC belt, he can effectively do what he’s said he meant to do and that’s to face Catterall.
FREE TO FIGHT!
Now that Taylor has freed the belt up, the aforementioned Jose Zepeda will now take on Jose “Jaguar” Ramirez (27-1, 17 KO’s) for the vacant title. Ramirez, currently ranked #2 (WBO) and #2 (WBC), is actually only one fight removed from his sole professional loss to Josh Taylor. In his one bout since then, Ramirez snagged a unanimous decision win over Jose Pedraza. As for Zepeda, he will be looking to get back busy and get revenge at the same time.
Zepeda, who is ranked #1 (WBC) and #5 (WBO), has been out of action for almost a year since his last duel against Josue Vargas. He will be gunning for revenge due to losing a majority decision to Jose Ramirez back on February 10, 2019. In fact, the WBC even went so far as to apologize to Zepeda for having him remain inactive for so long while waiting for his title shot. Now that they are lined up for a second collision, this should make for one fun prizefight.
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By: Bakari Simpson
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