Rankings (March 21): Wood, Edwards, Prograis, more

Rankings go up on Mondays, but we won’t have an update next week, so the next update will come on April 4.

Ranked fights the next two weeks:

• Junior Middleweight: (6) Tim Tszyu vs Terrell Gausha, Mar. 26
• Featherweight: (6) Kiko Martinez vs (7) Josh Warrington, Mar. 26
• Minimumweight: (2) Petchmanee CP Freshmart vs (3) Wanheng Menayothin, Mar. 29
• Minimumweight: (5) Ginjiro Shigeoka vs Tatsuro Nakashima, Mar. 27
• Women’s P4P: (8) Savannah Marshall vs Femke Hermans, Apr. 2

Upcoming Fights: (1) Tyson Fury vs (6) Dillian Whyte, Apr. 23 … (10) Tony Yoka vs Martin Bakole, May 14

Notes: Arsen Goulamirian had an extension to make a fight in the first three months of 2022, not have the fight, but even just announce one, same as GGG and Murata and some others. Goulamirian is on his last week.

Upcoming Fights: (1) Mairis Briedis vs Jai Opetaia, May 11

Upcoming Fights: (2) Dmitry Bivol vs Canelo Alvarez, May 7 … (1) Artur Beterbiev vs (3) Joe Smith Jr, June 18

Upcoming Fights: (1) Canelo Alvarez vs Dmitry Bivol [light heavyweight], May 7 … (2) David Benavidez vs David Lemieux, May 21 … (9) Zach Parker vs Demetrius Andrade, May 21

Upcoming Fights: (1) Gennadiy Golovkin vs (4) Ryota Murata, Apr. 9 … (3) Demetrius Andrade vs Zach Parker [super middleweight], May 21 … (2) Jermall Charlo vs Maciej Sulecki, June 18

Upcoming Fights: (6) Tim Tszyu vs Terrell Gausha, Mar. 26 … (3) Erickson Lubin vs (7) Sebastian Fundora, Apr. 9 … (5) Liam Smith vs Jessie Vargas, Apr. 30 … (1) Jermell Charlo vs (1) Brian Castano, May 14

Notes: Vergil Ortiz Jr didn’t fight this past weekend as planned, and his future in the division is in doubt. But we’ll see. Too early to really make any guesses there.

David Avanesyan did fight. He stopped Finland’s greatest active welterweight, Oskari Metz, in a round. That Metz is not ranked in the top 200 at 147 on BoxRec is another matter. I like Avanesyan, but I don’t know that Frank Warren has the ability — politically, I’m saying — to get Avanesyan a good fight, and honestly, how much does dominating at Euro level matter going forward? We know he can do that. Are any of his wins on his recent streak any better than Crowley beating Abdukakhorov or Butaev beating James or what Benn has been doing?

Upcoming Fights: (1) Errol Spence Jr vs (3) Yordenis Ugas, Apr. 16 … (8) Radzhab Butaev vs Eimantas Stanionis, Apr. 16 … (9) Conor Benn vs Chris van Heerden, Apr. 16 … (10) Cody Crowley vs Josesito Lopez, Apr. 16 … (5) Jaron Ennis vs Custio Clayton, May 21

Notes: Regis Prograis pretty much dominated Tyrone McKenna as expected, and Jose Zepeda also got a fight in, staying busy in Mexico with an easy win over a club-type fighter. This division will start sorting itself out once Taylor vacates his belts and goes to 147. Right now everyone is waiting for him to make that official and then the pieces for four vacant title fights and more will fall into place.

Upcoming Fights: TBA

Upcoming Fights: (6) Ryan Garcia vs Emmanuel Tagoe, Apr. 9 … (10) Isaac Cruz vs Yuriorkis Gamboa, Apr. 16 … (5) Gervonta Davis vs Rolando Romero, May 28 … (1) George Kambosos Jr vs TBA, June 5

Upcoming Fights: (1) Oscar Valdez vs (2) Shakur Stevenson, Apr. 30

Notes: Leigh Wood’s incredible comeback knockout of Michael Conlan was one for the books, and sees Wood cement his spot, even moving up a couple notches to No. 4 following two solid wins. He lost a lot of that fight with Conlan, but it wasn’t so one-sided, and he was making his move from the middle rounds on after getting dropped so hard at the end of round one that you would have been reasonable to assume his night wasn’t going another three minutes.

I still think Gary Russell Jr with two working arms beats most of these guys, but honestly he might go inactive before he fights again, so who cares if he moves down another spot? Saturday’s Martinez-Warrington 2 winner will probably jump him in the next update, too.

Upcoming Fights: (6) Kiko Martinez vs (7) Josh Warrington, Mar. 26 … (2) Mark Magsayo vs (8) Rey Vargas, July 9

Upcoming Fights: (2) Stephen Fulton Jr vs (4) Danny Roman, June 4 … (1) Murodjon Akhmadaliev vs (8) Ronny Rios, TBA

Upcoming Fights: (3) John Riel Casimero vs Paul Butler, Apr. 22

Upcoming Fights: TBA

Notes: Sunny Edwards picked up a scrappy win over Muhammad Waseem in Dubai, a quality victory as Waseem isn’t far outside the top 10 if he’s really outside of it at all. It’s not the deepest division.

The performance did open up more questions about how Edwards would handle Nakatani or Martinez. He definitely wants the Martinez fight. I might personally be a little leery of signing a deal to fight a guy at 112 who couldn’t make 115 for his last fight, but it’s the biggest fight he can do in the division, too.

Upcoming Fights: (2) Junto Nakatani vs Ryota Yamauchi, Apr. 9

Notes: Kenshiro Teraji got revenge and his belt back in a rematch with Masamichi Yabuki, and jumps back up to No. 2 in the rankings, while Yabuki falls to No. 8. THE fight to make in the division is once again the one it’s been for a while now, Kyoguchi vs Teraji.

Upcoming Fights: TBA

Upcoming Fights: (5) Ginjiro Shigeoka vs Tatsuro Nakashima, Mar. 27 … (2) Petchmanee CP Freshmart vs (3) Wanheng Menayothin, Mar. 29 … (4) Masataka Taniguchi vs Kai Ishizawa, Apr. 22

Upcoming Fights: (5) Errol Spence Jr vs Yordenis Ugas, Apr. 16 … (8) Tyson Fury vs Dillian Whyte, Apr. 23 … (1) Canelo Alvarez vs Dmitry Bivol, May 7 … (10) George Kambosos Jr vs TBA, June 5

Notes: Cecilia Braekhus is out due to inactivity. I know that’s a weird thing to remove her after a year while a few others have extensions, but we’re resetting to normal gradually, if that makes sense. Also, realistically, Braekhus just might not belong here anymore. She’s 40 and the sport is moving on with her sidelined. Alycia Baumgardner comes in at the No. 10 spot; I know she has just the one “quality win,” but women’s boxing is still tough to rank, and the way she destroyed Terri Harper was genuinely impressive. She edged out Jessica Nery, who won the WBA 108 lb title on March 11 against Yesica Bopp, to take the spot for me.

Upcoming Fights: (8) Savannah Marshall vs Femke Hermans, Apr. 2 … (5) Mikaela Mayer vs Jennifer Han, Apr. 9 … (1) Katie Taylor vs (3) Amanda Serrano, Apr. 30 … (10) Chantelle Cameron vs Kali Reis, TBA