Heavyweight contender Bogdan Dinu is training hard in his hometown of Buzau, Romania, and getting some excellent sparring work from former foe Jarrell “Big Baby” Miller as he prepares to face Daniel “Dynamite” Dubois for the WBA interim WBA World Heavyweight Championship.
The 6′ 5″ WBA #2-rated Dinu (20-2. 16 KOs) will face the 6′ 5″ WBA #11-rated Dubois (15-1, 14 KOs) of Greenwich, London, United Kingdom, on Saturday, June 5. An upset victory over the heavily hyped Dubois will put Dinu one step away from realizing his dream of becoming the first Romanian heavyweight champion of the world.
Joining the 34-year-old Dinu in camp are his brother George, co-trainer Ross Woolgrove and strength and conditioning coach Daniel Ortega. And this week, to provide world-class sparring, is well-known heavyweight contender and promotional stablemate Jarrell “Big Baby” Miller, who stopped Dinu in four rounds in 2018. The pair have remained friends.
“I am training in my home city in my own gym,” explained Dinu between workouts. “I have everything I need here and it’s going really good with Jarrell. He’s one of the most dangerous heavyweights in the world. He puts on a lot of pressure and that’s good for me to prepare for this fight. It’s an important fight and I must win!”
Dinu says he’s working on a surprise for the vaunted 23-year-old Dubois, who was considered a red-hot prospect before coming up short against fellow undefeated Brit Joe Joyce last November for the WBC Silver, WBO International, EBU European, Commonwealth (British Empire) and BBBofC British Heavyweight Championships. In the press, pre-fight, Dubois has been promising to knock Dinu out and return to the fast track.
“I see a young heavyweight who likes to fight, but has only faced easier opponents,” Dinu observed about Dubois. “His only tough fight was against Joe Joyce and we saw what happened. You’ll see by the result of our fight that his big reputation is exaggerated. He’s promising to knock me out? He’s just saying words because he hasn’t met me yet. He will have a big surprise when he looks in my eyes, just as tall as he is and not afraid of him at all. I am going to be very well-prepared and I have a lot of surprises for this kid.”
Dinu last fought in October 2020 with a second-round stoppage of German veteran Frank Bluemle in October 2020. His promoter, Greg Cohen, founder and CEO of Greg Cohen Promotions, says his fighter will be a different man when he shows up for battle on June 5.
“Bogdan Dinu has only lost to two of the top contenders in the division in Miller and Kubrat Pulev and he really should have won the Pulev fight,” said Cohen. “Bogdan is a very smart, experienced, tough guy with a great amateur pedigree and I don’t think Daniel Dubois is ready for someone with his world-class skills and experience. Dinu is working every day in camp with Jarrell, who is pushing him to his limits and taking him to new levels as a fighter. After June 5, Bogdan Dinu will be the interim WBA heavyweight champion in line to face one of the top dogs.”
The winner of Dubois-Dinu will become a record 5th reigning WBA heavyweight champion joining Anthony Joshua (super), Trevor Bryan (regular), Robert Helenius (gold), and Manuel Charr (recess). Fun times.
The WBA (We Be Asking), to quote Teddy Atlas, wants those sanctioning fees.
Plain and simple.
And fighters keep paying them for these worthless belts. Should keep their money and put all these clowns out of business. Nobody really knows or cares who these “champions” are any more.
The WBA is getting ridiculous. Why not have a Jimmy vs Timmy rematch on South Park, and say it is for the WBA Heavyweight Championship.
BTW, Dubois got exposed in his last fight, and I believe Dinu will knock out Dubois in the 7th round. Not that Dinu is any good. Dubois sucks.
Wouldn’t be surprised if you wind up being right.
Is there is a pecking order among these WBA champions? ‘Super’ would be top and I imagine ‘Gold’ is bottom. ‘Regular’ would surely be above ‘Interim’ but where dies ‘Recess’ fit in all this? LOL
I would think ‘Gold’ would be at the bottom as well, however, on the WBA’s website they list the gold champion in the category above the rankings, while the ‘Interim’ champion is, basically, ranked #1. So for example, Chris Colbert is ranked first at super featherweight and above him are Tank Davis at super, Roger Gutierrez at regular and Mark Urbanov (who I don’t think I have ever heard of), at gold. And the In-recess champions are listed above the rankings as well.
Dubois doesn’t suck. He was giving Joyce a good fight until suffering the eye injury. He’ll beat Dinu fairly comfortably. Billing it as a world heavyweight title fight is nonsense. I guess Frank Warren has sway with the WBA. Dinu has been chosen because he’s a reasonably safe opponent.
Dinu ranked at number 2 by the WBA. They have no shame.
How does the WBA justify having an unheard of fighter pair off against a bloke who quit last time out, and call the winner some form of world heavyweight champion?? Just rubbish
And what happens with Joe Joyce ??? After his underdog victory against Dubois does not deserve a big fight??
I know one of these guys would be Heavyweight Champion one day
*knew*, not know
If you don’t own a piece of the WBA Heavyweight World title, you ain’t shit!
LoL!! Or, you don’t have the right connections. Wonder if they have 5 separate groups of top 10 contenders for all those belts at in each division?
Surely the WBA will soon fade into obscurity.
I mean having multiple belts is bad enough but that one (other than the super champ) probably not being ranked in the top 20 makes it a sham.
Obviously they could dangle the AJ carrot to fighters who go down this route but would AJ ever consider any of these guys and would WBA strip him if he didn’t?
Pay the fees get ranked.
What two esteemed contenders will fight for the sixth available WBA heavyweight belt?