By Steve Kim
After winning the WBO super middleweight title from Arthur Abraham on April 9th as part of the Pacquiao-Bradley III undercard, Gilberto 'Zurdo' Ramirez (34-0, 24KOs) was set to make the first defense of his belt against Dominik Britsch on July 23rd on the pay-per-view undercard that featured the junior welterweight unification bout between Terence Crawford and Viktor Postol.
But an injury he suffered to his right hand during a sparring session just a few weeks before that fight scuttled those plans.
It basically shut him down for the rest of 2016. So when will we see the return of this tall, statuesque southpaw?
His promoter Bob Arum of Top Rank explained to BoxingScene.com - "They came into see me, the hand is cleared by the doctor but because of the Christmas holiday they want to go slow. They said the end of February would be their optimum time to fight."
Does Top Rank still have designs on facing middleweight king Gennady Golovkin (36-0, 33KOs) at some point in 2017?
"Absolutely, absolutely... particularly if 'Canelo' (Saul Alvarez) makes himself unavailable (to Golovkin)," said Arum.
Steve Kim is the news editor for BoxingScene.com.
