WBO mandatory Xander Zayas is confident that he will be getting a title shot against WBC and WBO junior middleweight champion Sebastian Fundora next. The 22-year-old Zayas (21-0, 13 KOs) already has his tall sparring partners set up for camp to help him train for the 6’5 1/2″ Fundora (22-1-1, 14 KOs).
Fundora’s Choice
Fundora’s promoter, Sampson Lewkowicz, still hasn’t said whether they’ll get the fight out of the way against Zayas or if they’ll focus on fighting a unification next. Lewkowicz said last Saturday night that Xander is young enough to where he can afford to wait.
“At 22, I’m in the conversation to fight for my first world title. Winning it would mean the world,” said Xander Zayas to Top Rank Boxing, about his hoping to fight WBC and WBO junior middleweight champion Sebastian Fundora next.
Interestingly, Top Rank has positioned Zayas to fight Fundora for his WBO belt rather than going in the direction of being made mandatory for IBF champion Bakhram Murtazaliev. They obviously know that Zayas’ lack of power would put him at the mercy of Bakhram, who would chop him apart.
Moreover, the IBF wouldn’t make it easy for Zayas to become mandatory the way the WBO. He would be expected to fight someone good like Yoeniz Tellez, and he likely wouldn’t do well against that guy. The WBO gave the green light for Xander to face Slowa Spomer in a title eliminator. That was like the WBO giving Zayas the mandatory position on a silver platter without him needing to work for it.
That’s good for him but also bad because he’s not ready to fight for a world title against Fundora because his opposition has been so poor his entire career. When promoters bend over backward to manufacture a fighter for marketing reasons, they’re totally unprepared for when they finally fight for a world title unless the champion is a poor one.
Puerto Rico Dream
“He’s a tall fighter, but if you look at his fights, he doesn’t know how to fight on the outside. He’s flat-footed. He doesn’t have the best feet. He is a warrior and knows how to fight, but I just feel like I can take advantage of a lot of things. from him,” continued Zayas.
“We already have the sparring partners set up for this camp. So, we already have an idea of who we’re bringing. We’re in conversation for a title shot.This is the fight [we hope] is going to happen next. Hopefully, I get my title shot in the summer and I bring that championship to Puerto Rico.”
There’s little chance that Sebastian Fundora will agree to defend his titles in Puerto Rico against Zayas unless it goes to purse bid and Top Rank wins. However, it doesn’t matter. Fundora is going to be a nightmare for Xander, no matter where the fight is staged, and the judges won’t get a chance to score the fight.
Zayas doesn’t possess the power or the experience to defeat a fighter like Fundora. Top Rank has kept Xander under protection since he turned pro and matched him against second-tier opposition to ‘develop’ him, but the downside is that he’s not ready for top-tier fighters.
The stuff that worked for Xander against fighters like Slowa Spomer won’t be effective against Fundora, and it doesn’t matter that he’s got a lot of tall sparring partners lined up for training camp. They’re not going to have the kind of talent that the ‘Towering Inferno’ has because if they did, they wouldn’t be working as sparring partners.
Zayas Experience Against These Fighters
– Charles Conwell
– Vergil Ortiz Jr
– Yoenis Tellez
– Serhii Bohachuk
– Tim Tszyu
– Jesus Ramos
– Jaron Ennis
– Israil Madrimov
– Erickson Lubin
Last Updated on 03/24/2025
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