Vergil Ortiz Jr gauging interest for a fight with Adrien Broner
In a recent Instagram post, the hard-hitting rising welterweight talent Vergil Ortiz Jr (15-0, 15 KO’s) proposed a hypothetical prizefight between himself and boxing wildcard Adrien “The Problem” Broner (33-4-1, 24 KO’s). In the picture, Ortiz Jr can be seen seated next to Broner and child. Within the caption below, Junior expressed a few words of respect before questioning who among the fans would like to see them lock horns.
From a competitive aspect, this is a great potential bout, especially when coming back from the mania brought on by the COVID-19 shutdown. Without question, Broner would serve as the young Golden Boy promoted fighter’s stiffest in-ring challenge. Clearly though, Vergil Ortiz Jr, who is ranked #8 (WBC) and #2 (WBO), is ready to attempt solving “The Problem”.
So far, Ortiz Jr has remained an exciting boxer whose shown immense future potential. He is coming off a very one-sided December 13 victory over Brad “King” Solomon (28-3, 9 KO’s). After chopping Solomon down with thudding body blows and sending him to the canvas three times, Ortiz Jr collected the TKO on the third occasion.
IT TAKES TWO
Being the notoriously unpredictable character that he is, the boxing world had to prepare for any manner of response from Adrien Broner. However, perhaps a bit surprisingly, Broner expressed his genuine willingness to tangle with Ortiz. That is, so long as Golden Boy played ball financially at the negotiation table.
MO MONEY MO PROBLEMS
Unfortunately, if the bout was ever a realistic possibility, the finances of the bout would likely remain an insurmountable hurdle. Well, that will be the case if Broner sticks to his guns. As his personality demands, from time to time Broner is known to launch strange and seemingly unprovoked social media rants.
In previous rants, he has ridiculed other fighters, claimed that he was leaving the sport, and hinted at suicide. And to be clear, this list is not comprehensive. In his most recent outburst, Broner has demanded a minimum of ten million dollars for his next outing. Getting his hands on that hefty sum of money was always going to be a challenge. Yet, obtaining such a chunky bag of money with no live gate revenue, coming off a pair of defeats split by a draw, and not having enjoyed a victory since 2017 makes it all very improbable.
It’s still a great potential fight though!
By: Bakari Simpson
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