Jaron Ennis Set To Face Undefeated Knockout Artist In New Weight Class: “The Fight Is Happening”

Jaron Ennis is preparing for the next chapter of his career after deciding to vacate his welterweight world titles and move up.

The 28-year-old from Philadelphia is 35 fights into what has been a promising professional career, remaining unbeaten since his debut back in 2016.

This year, he unified the WBA and IBF welterweight belts with a victory over Eimantas Stanionis, stopping the durable Lithuanian in the sixth round of their bout at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City.

Despite the impressive performance, ‘Boots’ revealed post-fight that he has been told by doctors that he is not performing optimally due to tough weight cuts at the 147lbs limit. He made the decision to move to 154, something that has been discussed for some time now.

Talk immediately turned to an all-action clash with knockout artist Vergil Ortiz Jr, though a lack of progression has left some fans wondering whether or not both men wanted the fight.

In an interview with Fight Hub TV, Ennis’ promoter Eddie Hearn has now confirmed that it will be happening after Ennis has a bedding in fight first.

“So we got asked if we’d fight Vergil Ortiz on the August 16th card, which we said, ‘yes, we’d be interested.’ Vergil came back and said ‘I’m not ready till later in the year’ right? Then we decided to lock in a fight for Boots end of September, beginning of October. Then Turki came back and said ‘Do you wanna look at the fight for November 22nd?’ and we said ‘Look we’re taking this fight as our first fight at 54, we will agree the Vergil Ortiz fight in the process.’

“It’s not like we’re gonna take a fight and we can speak after, we can lock that fight in now. Myself and Golden Boy are talking about that fight, it’s gonna be one of the biggest fights in America. As I said to Vergil, you two guys are two young, brilliant fighters. This fight is happening. December, January or February, Boots vs Ortiz will happen.”

Ortiz currently reigns as the WBC interim champion in the division, with his most recent defence coming against Israil Madrimov on February 22. The 27-year-old from Texas ended his first 21 fights inside the distance before twice going to points wins for a record of 23-0. After recent hand surgery, it is likely that ‘Boots’ will be his next fight with nothing in between.