Alexandro Santiago is the WBC bantamweight champion, and this week he’ll be looking to win the first defense of his title. However, his upcoming opponent, Junto Nakatani, is hoping to swipe that belt away from him.
Santiago has had himself a wonderful career, albeit he’s accumulated a ton of draws. With a career record of 28-3-5 coming into this bout, he’s ready to go against Nakatani. He’s been working his way back into belt contention for a while, and recently claimed a vacant bantamweight title by defeating Nonito Donaire in July of 2023. In fact, scorecards graded this as one of the best fights of his career.
His opposition, Nakatani, has had an excellent boxing career of his own. Nakatani is undefeated with a 26-0 record with 19 knockouts to his name. If he’s able to get a big win here against Santiago, he’ll actually become a three-weight world champion. He was a WBO flyweight champion from the years 2020 until 2022, and then knocked off Andrew Moloney for the WBO super flyweight belt in May of 2023. That fight was a great showing as well, with him knocking out Moloney three times before securing a knockout in the final round.
Alexandro Santiago Bout Going To Be New Challenge For Nakatani
Nakatani has battled weight issues recently, and he revealed that’s part of the reason for him bumping up his weight class and going up against Santiago. This fight will see him compete at 118 lbs. for the first time, with him usually competing at the 115 lb. mark. When asked about it, he said, “I would have to admit that my weight issue was the decisive factor in moving up a weight class. I knew I could have stayed at junior bantamweight a bit longer, but when I actually moved up a weight class, I felt my body getting bigger and bigger.” Nakatani says he doesn’t feel any different despite the increase and knows that he’s going to be able to adapt in this upcoming fight against Santiago.
These two fighters will compete on February 24th in Ryogoku Kokugikan National Sumo Arena in Tokyo, Japan.
