Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis and Eimantas Stanionis are close to a unified fight for the two IBF and WBO welterweight belts in April.
Ennis-Stanionis in April?
IBF champion Boots Ennis (33-0, 29 KOs) will face the first high-quality opponent of his career if that happens, and fans will be interested to see how he responds to the power and pressure of WBA 147-lb champion Stanionis (15-0, 9 KO).
If the fight happens, it will be Matchroom shown on DAZN. Whether he will be put on PPV is questionable because Stanionis is not famous. Boots has yet to reach that level due to his lackluster opposition during his nine-year professional career.
Ennis, 27, received a lot of criticism for his decision not to accept a fight against WBC interim junior middleweight champion Vergil Ortiz Jr. on Turki Al-Sheikh’s Feb. 22 card on DAZN PPV in Riyadh. Boots was rumored to have been offered the highest salary of his career 8 million dollars, which is a crazy amount for him to turn down.
But he wants to unify the welterweight division to collect all four belts before moving on, and vows to finish what he started, come hell or high water. You hope that Jaron doesn’t live to regret it later.
Can the boots handle Stanionis?
“Will we finally get that Unification welterweight fight he’s been waiting for?” said Bernardo Osuna on Box conditiontalking about Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis wanting a unification fight against WBA champion Eimantas Stanionis or one of the other champions.
“They’re certainly closing in, and it’s a really tough test for Boots. He’s looking at the fight against Eimantas Stanionis, who I think is one of the most underrated fighters in all of boxing,” said Mike Coppinger. “He’s lost all of 2023 after several fights against Vergil Ortiz were called off and I’m told they’re getting close to a deal for a fight in April. However, there is no agreement yet.
“This is a big step forward for Boots, who hasn’t fought anyone hard yet. Stanionis brings the pressure; he can punch and I hope the fight ends. It will be the Matchroom show on DAZN,” said Coppinger.
It’s a big step up for Ennis from what he’s faced over the past nine years, and it’s not certain he’ll win this fight. Stanionis is a good fighter with power and Boots gets hit a lot in his fights. He depends on his offense being his defense, and those types of fighters don’t do well in the long run.
Eventually they run into someone with too much power and get knocked out. What was surprising was how Ennis was torched by Karen Chukhadzhian in his last fight on November 9, and he is not known as a big puncher.
Final boost
“It’s about time Boots got in the ring with someone,” said Tim Bradley. “I can tell you that. He had a lot of opportunities to get in the ring with a lot of guys, including Vergil Ortiz, but he decided not to. That was clearly his plan from the beginning. He wants to unify the titles against Stanionis.”
Bradley is right. It was also time for Ennis to finally fight someone as he certainly looked weak when he turned down a fight against Vergil Jr on February 22nd.
“I just finished studying film four days ago. It will be an exciting fight,” said Bradley. “Stanionis is a fighter who comes forward, he is very aggressive. Throws punches in piles. He can hit hard with both hands, but so can Boots. But the difference is that Stanionis, I don’t think he understands trigonometry.
“He doesn’t understand angles. He doesn’t understand how to get into another position, because all he knows is gas and no brakes,” Bradley said of Stanionis’ flaws.
