WBO welterweight champion Brian Norman Jr. (28-0, 22 KOs) took a verbal shot at Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis about him fleeing the 147-lb division following his fifth-round annihilation of the challenger Jin Sasaki (19-2-1, 17 KOs) on Thursday night at the Ota-City General Gymnasium in Tokyo, Japan.
Ennis Avoids Norman Showdown
Norman Jr. looked like a stone-cold killer tonight, knocking down Sasaki three times in the contest, ending with a brutal one-punch KO in round five that ended the night. Sasaki lay on the canvas flat on his back, eyes staring at the lights, while the Japanese crowd was quiet. The fight was stopped at 0:46 after a perfunctory count by referee Gustavo Tomas.
In the post-fight interview, Norman Jr. let the fans know that he’d wished that former IBF and WBA welterweight champion ‘Boots’ Ennis had been his opponent tonight, but he’d “run” from the division, moving up to junior middleweight. After the way Norman Jr. looked tonight against Sasaki, it’s plausible that Ennis beat cheeks, high-tailing it out of the 147-lb division rather than fight him and get similar treatment.
“About my future, I wish I had a certain fight coming up, but they heard the storm coming. You know what happens when the storm is coming. You grab your boots and run,” said Brian Norman Jr., in the post-fight interview, taking a verbal shot at Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis, following his fifth-round knockout win over Jin Sasaki in Tokyo.
“We shall see what’s next for me. Hopefully, in October or November, we can get something in, but we shall see.”
Norman’s Reign of Terror
It’s not just this performance from Norman Jr. tonight that would scare off ‘Boots.’ It’s the way Norman Jr. had looked in his two previous fights, destroying Derrieck Cuevas and Giovani Santillan. You can’t blame Ennis if he got frightened off after watching those fights, figuring that it’s safer at 154 where his team can pick and choose carefully.
Losing to one of the top 154-pounders would result in less of a backlash for Ennis than if Norman Jr beat him. It would sink Boots’ career if Brian Jr knocked him out.
Last Updated on 06/19/2025
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