Bakhram Murtazaliev says he is considering moving up to 160lbs to challenge Erislandy Lara for his WBA middleweight title because the other two champions at 154 are busy.
IBF middleweight champion Junior Murtazaliev (23-0, 17 KOs) seems to have been frozen out by the top fighters at 154, ignored and sidetracked.
Too dangerous?
Bakhram’s third-round knockout of former WBO champion Tim Tszyu on October 19 may have scared off any contenders or champions who would be willing to fight him before this demolition job. He better stay at 154kg because he won’t have better luck until middleweight.
Unfortunately for Murtazaliev, 41-year-old Lara (31-3-3, 19 KOs) is unlikely to agree to fight him either. Lara hasn’t fought a top-level opponent in seven years since his loss to Jarrett Hurd in 2018.
Lara has feasted on lesser fighters over the past seven years, including washed-up Danny Garcia, Michael Zerafa, Thomas Lamanna, Gary O’Sullivan, Greg Vendetti and Ramon Alvarez.
If someone like Turki Al-Sheikh doesn’t look out for Murtazaliev to help him fight, he’ll be stuck defending whoever his management can dig up in the IBF ranks. This is both good and bad.
If no good fighter ever wants to fight Murtazaliev, he can hold the IBF 154-lb title for years without losing it. But on the downside, he won’t make the big bucks that he could if the bigger guys were willing to fight him.
The Cost of Avoidance
Before beating Tszyu, Murtazaliev had been a pro for ten years, fighting little-known opposition. Even though he never lost, his career went nowhere.
He wasn’t affiliated with one of the big promotion companies and that hurt. Promoters like Eddie Hearn and Top Rank would still have a lot of trouble picking fights for Murtazaliev because he would be considered too dangerous for other fighters to want to face him.
When you’re as good as Murtazaliev, sometimes it pays not to look that good because then you might get into a fight.
If both champs at 154 have found opponents, maybe they will move up to 160 and take Lara’s belt?
— bakhram murtazaliev (@bakhram95) January 13, 2025
