{"id":765214,"date":"2026-09-09T16:34:08","date_gmt":"2026-09-09T16:34:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/765214\/"},"modified":"2026-09-09T16:34:08","modified_gmt":"2026-09-09T16:34:08","slug":"the-last-man-to-knock-naoya-inoue-down-delivers-verdict-on-bam-rodriguez-fight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/765214\/","title":{"rendered":"The last man to knock Naoya Inoue down delivers verdict on ‘Bam’ Rodriguez fight"},"content":{"rendered":"

Naoya Inoue<\/a> could be set for his toughest test yet as he gears up for a potential clash with three-division world champion Jesse \u2018Bam\u2019 Rodriguez, and the last person to have floored Inoue has cast his verdict on the much-reported showdown.<\/p>\n

Inoue has been remarkable throughout a stellar career thus far, becoming a four-division world champion and multi-weight undisputed ruler, defending all four super-bantamweight titles on seven occasions to date.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2018The Monster\u2019 has hit the deck twice since 2024 though, dropped for the first time in his career when tasked with Luis Nery and then again in a surprisingly difficult clash with Ramon Cardenas last May<\/a>, with Inoue eventually winning by seventh round stoppage.<\/p>\n

Now, it seems as though Rodriguez will be next for Inoue, in a battle that could be remembered for generations to come, and speaking to Ring Magazine<\/a>, Cardenas labelled the proposed meeting as a \u2018good fight for Bam\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cHonestly, that would be a good fight. I have known Bam since he was 10 years old, I have known Bam for a long time. That will be a really good fight for Bam, for Inoue, for boxing, it will be a really good fight because both of them are really good fighters.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would love to see that fight happen because I know Bam is very competitive and Inoue is also very competitive. The thing about it is, with people from San Antonio, we will fight anybody, so I know that if they offered Bam that fight, he would take it right away.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt will be good, I can\u2019t necessarily tell you who I think will win or who I am going for but for them it will be a huge fight and I wish Bam nothing but the best if that fight happens.\u201d<\/p>\n

Whilst Inoue-Rodriguez is being targeted for spring 2027, it is understood that Rodriguez will first partake in a bantamweight title unification against WBO 118lb champion Christian Medina later this year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Naoya Inoue could be set for his toughest test yet as he gears up for a potential clash…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":765215,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2560,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-765214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-boxing","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/765214","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=765214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/765214\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/765215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=765214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=765214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=765214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}