Teofimo Lopez and Devin Haney are set to face off in a big boxing match. The two champions will meet on Saturday, August 16 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. They'll fight at a catchweight of around 145lbs, which means Lopez's WBO super-lightweight title won't be on the line.
Both fighters come into this bout with recent wins under their belts. Lopez, the 27-year-old WBO super-lightweight champ, just defended his title against mandatory challenger Arnold Barboza Jr. Haney, a two-weight world champion, beat former unified super-lightweight champ Jose Ramirez in his last fight.
These victories happened at a boxing card in Times Square, New York City last month. The event got fans excited for more action from these top fighters.
Oscar De La Hoya, the boxing legend, thinks this could be a great fight. But he's worried about how Haney might approach it. In a recent interview, De La Hoya said:
"We all know how it's going to look. I think Devin's going to obviously get on his bike, unless he doesn't because Devin has a style that can walk you down and chop you down and knock you down, so I don't know why he runs so much."
De La Hoya understands why some fighters choose to move around the ring a lot. He explained:
"I can understand Ramirez chasing him around the ring, after the year's lay off and getting obviously knocked down by Ryan and you know maybe not being confident with his chin."
But he thinks Haney could do better by changing his style. De La Hoya believes Haney has the skills to fight more like Floyd Mayweather:
"He has the ability to fight like a Mayweather, stay there in front, angles, side to side, he's special, he's got talent but he has to stop running, people don't like that, Devin vs Teo is a great fight. but not if Devin runs."
Lopez won his WBO super-lightweight title two years ago from Josh Taylor, who was the undisputed champion at the time. Haney had planned to rematch Ryan Garcia later this year, but those plans fell through when Garcia lost to Rolando 'Rolly' Romero on May 2.
Now, all eyes are on this newly announced fight between Lopez and Haney. Fans are eager to see if Haney will take De La Hoya's advice and make the fight more exciting by staying in front of Lopez and using angles. Or will he stick to his usual style? We'll find out on August 16 in Saudi Arabia.
