{"id":279458,"date":"2025-11-23T20:10:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-23T20:10:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/279458\/"},"modified":"2025-11-23T20:10:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-23T20:10:11","slug":"zurdo-ramirez-to-defend-unified-world-titles-vs-robin-safar-jan-16","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/279458\/","title":{"rendered":"Zurdo Ramirez To Defend Unified World Titles vs. Robin Safar, Jan. 16"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gilberto Ramirez<\/a> and Robin Safar<\/a> have struck a deal to fight for Zurdo’s WBA and WBO cruiserweight world titles on Jan. 16 in Palm Desert, California, sources tell The Ring<\/a>.
The fight will be paired with the Alexis Rocha-Raul Curiel rematch on DAZN<\/a>. Zurdo must win to keep his planned May 2 fight with David Benavidez<\/a> intact.
After Benavidez stopped Anthony Yarde<\/a> in Round 7 of Saturday\u2019s The Ring IV main event in Riyadh, he announced he would move up 25 pounds<\/a> and chase a title in a third weight class with a fight vs. Ramirez. <\/p>\n

Benavidez, The Ring\u2019s No. 2 boxer at 175 pounds, was making the first defense of his WBC light heavyweight title. The victory was Benavidez\u2019s first inside the distance at light heavyweight after two decision wins.<\/p>\n

Ramirez, like Benavidez, is a former super middleweight titleholder. The Mexican moved up to 175 pounds and was routed in a light heavyweight title bid vs. Dmitry Bivol<\/a> in 2022.
Ramirez (48-1, 30 KOs) is The Ring\u2019s No. 1 boxer at 200 pounds (Jai Opetaia<\/a> is The Ring\u2019s cruiserweight champion.) Ramirez, 34, scored a unanimous-decision victory over former titleholder Yuniel Dorticos in June. Afterward, he underwent shoulder surgery<\/a>.
Safar, like Ramirez, is promoted by Golden Boy. The 32-year-old Swede, who fights out of Las Vegas, became a contender at 200 pounds when he upset former champion Sergey Kovalev<\/a> via decision in May 2024 in Riyadh. Safar (18-0, 13 KOs) dropped Kovalev in the 10th and final round. <\/p>\n

Safar is rated No. 9 by The Ring at cruiserweight. <\/p>\n

Benavidez, a Mexican-American, is slated to meet Ramirez in a Cinco De Mayo showdown, the boxing holiday reserved for boxing\u2019s top stars. This week, Benavidez (31-0, 25 KOs) has been vocal about his desire to wrest away the date from Canelo Alvarez<\/a>, boxing\u2019s top attraction.
The Ring\u2019s Manouk Akopyan reported earlier this month<\/a> that Ramirez would stage a tune-up fight Jan. 16.<\/p>\n

Mike Coppinger is The Ring\u2019s senior insider. Follow him on X\/Instagram: @MikeCoppinger. He co-hosts Inside The Ring every Monday with Max Kellerman.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Gilberto Ramirez and Robin Safar have struck a deal to fight for Zurdo’s WBA and WBO cruiserweight world…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":279459,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2560,6842,6836,6841,6840,6834,6102,6837,6838,6839,6835,6588,6847,6846,6830,6828,6829,6844,6831,6827,6848,6843,101,6845,6826,6833,56,54,55,6832],"class_list":["post-279458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-boxing","tag-boxing-community","tag-boxing-fights","tag-boxing-history","tag-boxing-interviews","tag-boxing-magazine","tag-boxing-news","tag-boxing-photos","tag-boxing-rankings","tag-boxing-schedule","tag-boxing-videos","tag-boxing-results","tag-disqualification","tag-draw","tag-fight","tag-fighter","tag-fighter-news","tag-knockout","tag-latest-boxing-matches","tag-ring","tag-ring-magazine","tag-split-decision","tag-sports","tag-technical-knockout","tag-the-ring","tag-top-fighters","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-upcoming-boxing-matches"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279458","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279458"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279458\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/279459"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}