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Photo by Naoki Fukuda
1. Look to Golden Boy Promotions
Fortunately for Vasyl Lomachenko, current political barriers in the sport of boxing do not block him from possible fights with Oscar De La Hoya’s stable of fighters at Golden Boy Promotions.
Golden Boy currently has a short list of legitimate contenders in the Featherweight division who are all considered to be top 15 fighters and who could make for interesting and exciting matchups with Lomachenko.
Ronny Rios (24-1-0, 10 KOs) was a fighter who many had high hopes for before he was knocked out by Robinson Castellanos back in their October 2014 fight.
He’s since bounced back with a clear and unanimous 10-round decision victory over Sergio Frias back on March 20, 2015, a fight that was televised on Fox Sports 1.
A fight with Rios at this point would not be a step forward for Lomachenko, since Rios is arguably on the same level as Gamalier Rodriguez at this time.
Castellanos (21-10-0, 13 KOs) doesn’t carry the prettiest record in boxing, but has won thirteen of his last fourteen fights, including the impressive win over Rios.
Castellanos might be somewhat of a stretch option for Lomachenko at this point, considering he’s currently ranked No. 1 to Gary Russell Jr.’s WBC title and would be a solid and winnable option for Russell’s first defense.
But if advisor Al Haymon decides to avoid the mandatory defense against Castellanos in order to put Russell in with one of the names from the Haymon stable, then Castellanos wouldn’t be a bad option for Lomachenko’s next defense.
Jayson Velez (22-0-1, 16 KOs) got his first shot at a world title back in November 2014 against current IBF world title holder Evgeny Gradovich.
It was a hard fought and controversial decision draw, a fight that many viewers thought should have been awarded to the champion Gradovich who was more aggressive from round-to-round.
Velez did show amazing grit in the fight though, which was televised as part of the undercard for Terence Crawford vs. Ray Beltran on HBO Championship Boxing.
It’s hard to believe that anybody would complain about a matchup between Lomachenko and Velez.
