Tuesday morning on the East Coast, “The Monster” Naoya Inoue once again successfully defended his Undisputed Super Bantamweight Championship in Tokyo, Japan against TJ Doheny. Inoue landed a vicious body shot in the seventh round, which made Doheny unable to continue in the fight.
Inoue, 31, now moves to 28-0 with 25 knockouts in his career while being a two-division Undisputed Champion. Inoue has finished his last nine opponents in a row and is continuing to make a case as the No. 1 pound-for-pound boxer in the world. The two other fighters that are highly regarded on those lists are Undisputed Heavyweight Champion Oleksandr Usyk (22-0) and Undisputed Welterweight Champion Terence Crawford (41-0).
Even though this wasn’t the traditional domination we are used to seeing from Naoya Inoue, he still led on the judges’ scorecards 59-55, 58-56 and 59-55 before the contest was stopped. Doheny landed some clean punches in the early rounds of the fight, leaving some marks on the face of Inoue. But it never felt like Inoue was in serious trouble as he stayed cool, calm and collected and continued to put pressure on Doheny. Early in the fight, Inoue made it a priority to damage the body of Doheny.
After the fight, Inoue’s promoter, Bob Arum of Top Rank Boxing, stated that Inoue would make his long-awaited return to fight in the United States after a three-year hiatus at the beginning of 2025. He will return to Tokyo to defend his Undisputed Bantamweight Title for a third time before the end of 2024.
Naoya Inoue was -1600 in this matchup to get the victory by way of knockout on DraftKings Sportsbook. Inoue has now defeated three of the top 15 fighters in the bantamweight division according to BoxRec’s rankings. It is unknown who will be next to challenge “The Monster” but whoever it is will need to bring their very best to stand a chance against the undefeated superstar.
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