Bam Rodriguez is now a three-division world champion, stopping Antonio Vargas in the sixth round tonight in Glendale, Ariz., to win the WBA bantamweight title.
Rodriguez (24-0, 17 KO) did face a game opponent in Vargas (19-2-1, 11 KO), with Vargas landing some decent early shots and coming to fight and all that. But the “struggles” of Rodriguez may get a little overstated. It’s not really that unusual for him to lose a couple early rounds, or for that to be the case for a lot of top fighters in championship
fights.
In the end, he still finished this less than halfway into the scheduled distance. He’d put Vargas down hard in the fifth round, and finished him with a peach of a short punch in the sixth.
Rodriguez gave Vargas his credit for bringing the fight.
“I felt great, I felt like I did everything right,” Bam said. “Antonio Vargas was a lot tougher than I expected. He had good pop in his punch, too. Thankfully I was able to get him out of there in the sixth. … I didn’t think he had pop like that. I knew he had some. And he was a lot stronger than I thought. And even after that first knockdown, he got up and was fighting like nothing ever happened, so a lot of respect to him.”
Is Naoya Inoue next for Bam Rodriguez?
Rodriguez was, of course, asked if super bantamweight king Naoya Inoue will be next. He played it cagey on live TV.
“I’m ready for whoever, whenever,” he said, before being asked again. “Whoever they say. Throw ‘em in front of me, I’m gonna say yes. Eddie (Hearn) knows that, my whole team knows that.”
Rodriguez has said he’ll face anyone he’s told, and repeated that this evening. He’s also floated the idea of staying at 118 lbs for another fight, which could be a unification with WBC champ Takuma Inoue, the brother of Naoya.
“The inevitable fight will get made, it’s just a case of when,” promoter Eddie Hearn said. He also mentioned the chance of Bam facing WBO bantamweight titleholder Christian Medina.
“If the right offer comes, and the right opportunity comes, Bam will be there,” Hearn added. “And trust me, he ain’t getting beat. There’s no one on this planet who’s beating Bam Rodriguez at 118 or 122 lbs, not even Naoya Inoue.”
