The latest extension turned out to be the most productive for the Frank Sanchez-Richard Torrez Jnr IBF heavyweight title eliminator.
BoxingScene has confirmed that both sides were able to come to terms ahead of their rescheduled January 27 purse bid hearing, which was canceled as a result. Their elimination contest will land on a March 28 Premier Boxing Champions (PBC) on Prime Video pay-per-view event from MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.
The show will be headlined by the rescheduled Sebastian Fundora-Keith Thurman WBC junior middleweight title fight.
Fight Freaks Unite’s Dan Rafael was the first to report the deal reached between Sanchez and Torrez.
Cuba’s Sanchez is promoted by Warriors Boxing and co-managed by Mike Borao and Lupe Valencia. Through that relationship has come his frequent appearances on PBC shows. Torrez Jnr – who hails from Tulare, California – signed with Top Rank out of the amateurs.
The development puts an end to a process that dated back to last April, and which saw Sanchez wait out six separate rounds of ordered fights. Torrez, 14-0 (12 KOs), initially declined the opportunity when it was first offered last year, but only because he already had a fight scheduled at the time.
That fight turned out to be a quick hit, as Torrez stopped Poland’s Tomas Salek in the first round on November 15 in San Luis Potosi, Mexico. Soon thereafter, the unbeaten heavyweight and 2021 Olympic silver medalist for the U.S. informed the IBF of his availability to face Sanchez, who still needed a dance partner at the time.
Several extensions were granted, both during the negotiation period and the purse bid process. Normally – and as it often related to Sanchez’s plight in moving forward with this opportunity – the requests for extensions are mere stalling tactics.
This time, it proved to be just enough to find common ground and come to an agreement.
The timing will leave Sanchez, 25-1 (18 KOs), out of the ring for more than a year. He has not fought since last February in a confidence restoring bout in Tijuana, Mexico. It came nine months after his lone career defeat, a seventh-round stoppage to Agit Kabayel in the May 2024 WBC interim title fight in Riyadh.
Torrez was comparatively busier but still had his slowest year as a pro, with just two fights in 2025 after having fought four times each in 2022, 2023 and 2024.
The slowdown was due in part to Top Rank no longer having a network or streaming deal. Their long run with ESPN and its platforms came to an end last summer. The Las Vegas-headquartered company is now reduced to streaming the occasional card on its Top Rank Classics FAST Channel and piecemealing the rest of its rosters on shows such as this.
Whoever prevails in Sanchez-Torrez will become the IBF mandatory challenger for unified heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk, 24-1 (15 KOs). The point in which a mandatory title fight is ordered, however, will not be determined for some time. Ukraine’s Usyk is currently eyeing a summertime return, likely in a voluntary defense.
