Alexis Rocha seeks to extend his climb up the welterweight ratings by taking on Raul Curiel, an undefeated product of Mexico, in a bout pitting Golden Boy Promotions roster mates Dec. 14 at Toyota Center in Ontario, California, BoxingScene learned Wednesday.
The 27-year-old Rocha (25-2, 16 KOs) is ranked No. 2 in the WBO rankings behind new titleholder Brian Norman Jr. and his top-ranked mandatory contender Shakhram Giyasov (16-0), and No. 7 in the IBF rankings.
The southpaw from Orange County, California, steps up from smaller venues in Indio, California, and Inglewood, California, to head the DAZN-streamed card against the 28-year-old Curiel (15-0, 13 KOs).
Rocha has rallied from a sixth-round knockout loss to Giovanni Santillan in October 2023 to defeat Fredrick Lawson (retired, seventh round on March 30) and Santiago Dominguez by unanimous decision on July 19.
Curiel has knocked out or stopped 10 consecutive opponents. He most recently stopped Jorge Marron Jr. in the first round April 27 in Fresno, California.
Golden Boy secured the date and venue as Premier Boxing Champions also holds Crypto.com Arena – home of the Los Angeles Lakers – on Dec. 14 for a fight card that would include David Benavidez.
With PBC also seeking to plan late-2024 dates for its unified junior-middleweight champion Sebastian Fundora and lightweight champion Gervonta “Tank” Davis, an official close to the talks said it will be interesting to see which bout settles where and when considering the pay-per-view heavyweight-title fight between champion Oleksandr Usyk and Tyson Fury is earlier in the day on Dec. 21.
“You’ve heard people say, ‘Things change day to day.’ In boxing, things change hour by hour,” a boxing official monitoring the scheduling situation for his fighter told BoxingScene.
Lance Pugmire is BoxingScene’s senior U.S. writer and an assistant producer for ProBox TV. Pugmire has covered boxing since the early 2000s, first at the Los Angeles Times and then at The Athletic and USA Today. He won the Boxing Writers’ Association of America’s Nat Fleischer Award in 2022 for career excellence.
