By Joe Koizumi
Photos by Naoki Fukuda
WBA super flyweight champion Joshua Franco has lost his belt on the scale since he couldn’t make the class limit of 115 pounds (52.1 kilogram) on Friday in Tokyo, Japan. He at first scaled in at 55.2 kilogram, 3.1 kg (some 6.8 pounds) over the limit. Given two hours for weight reduction, Franco, after one hour and fifty minutes, reduced only 200 gram, some half a pound, to his final weight of 55.0 kilogram (121.5 pounds by JBC). The challenger and former WBO ruler Kazuto Ioka has made weight at 52.0 kilogram (114.75 pounds by JBC) at his first trip to the scale. Their weight difference was no less than 3.0 kilogram (6.75 pounds by JBC), but the fight will go ahead as scheduled tomorrow.
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I heard an interview he had where he said he was having difficulty at the weight, but this is crazy. Got a title fight at junior bantam and barely makes super bantam. After this fight, can he make 118?? Franco won’t have much of a chance at all at 122 imo.
Happy Friday everyone. Age of course plays a role in being able to make weight as our bodies mature, but a bigger influence is our lifestyle. If Franco is ticketing up into the 40s between fights, the seesaw can only take you so far. It’s a shame. Losing a belt on the scales is a slap in the face to everyone. If you cannot make weight anymore, move up it get your ducks in order.
What I learned in two different occasions is Franco’s lack of discipline on training After this incident he will banned by JBC to fight in Japan, as it happened to Luis Nery,
You can see the disappointment in Robert Garcia’s face. When you lose on weight you let everyone down.
Well if you can’t make weight or have a hard time maintaining the weight for your class then it’s time to move up in weight. It’s simple as that. Loosing your title in the weigh-in is pretty damn bad. You get stripped if you can’t make weight, but they still make you go through with the fight regardless of the weight difference that makes no sense to me. Your opponent can still earn the title if he wins but you can’t. If Franco wins the title remains vacant. I don’t like that about boxing. If you can’t make weight you loose the title and don’t fight period. Why punish them then reward them with money.
It’s simple, the arena has sold tickets, the venue has pay the rent for the event, everything is set up for the event, that is why the show goes on.
This is absurd and completely unprofessional on the part of Franco. It’s not like he missed the weight by a pound or two pounds. This is outrageous as he wasn’t even close, which means Franco had a good idea several weeks before the fight he wasn’t going to make the weight. I don’t know what’s up with these modern fighters and their routinely not making weight. I grew up with this sport in the 80’s and 90’s and rarely, if ever, saw this crap. Dude, if you can’t make the weight and know you won’t be making the weight, show some integrity and let the event organizers know instead of wasting people’s time, money, and effort. I hope Ioka wins and beats Franco convincingly.
Not so many divisions then-less trying to squeeze into a division too small for them
How can a professional
be six pounds over the weight at such a low weight category, this is so unprofessional he should be fined by the commission, think of the promoter all the money spent to advertise and promote the fight it is now down the drain. I can not fathom this
It’s well known, that Franco an Bam Rodriguez gain a lot of weight between fights, i read in some report in internet that the tend to go up to 140 lbs. When they don’t have a fight. 25 lbs over the super fly weight limit.