Jonathan Navarro targeting Arnold Barboza, tips Liam Paro to defeat Richardson Hitchins
Dec 6, 2024 • 11:00 AM ET
WATERFORD, Ireland – Jonathan Navarro hopes victory over Jair Valtierra in Ireland on Saturday will catapult him into a world title fight.
Navarro, 18-0 (9 KOs), lives in Buena Park, California, and the junior welterweight contender returned after five years out with a controversial win over Clarence Booth on ProBox TV in July, but he believes a win over Valtierra here at the SETU Arena in South East Ireland, will set him up for a run at the division’s bigger names, including Arnold Barboza, who is in line to face Jack Catterall to decide the WBO’s No. 1 contender spot to face Teofimo Lopez Jnr.
“I’ve always asked my manager for Barboza – that’s one fight I’ve always wanted,” Navarro said. “Boring fighter. I don’t care if he hears it. Another one would be, [Richardson] Hitchins. I know Hitchins can’t take that pressure. I know I can kill that.”
Hitchins will challenge Australia’s IBF titleholder Liam Paro on Saturday in Puerto Rico, but Navarro does not expect the title to change hands.
“I think Paro beats him,” he continued. “Hitchins can’t take that pressure. We saw it in that his last fight [against Gustavo Lemos]. I thought he lost.
“But there’s a lot of fighters out there that pressure that look like slow fighters; they might look slow, but the pressure kills. It gets you tired, and after the third or fourth round you’re getting tired because you can’t breathe. You try to take seconds to breathe, you hug and they’re still hitting you.
“It’s just something that I think Hitchins will never get over. It’s the New York style. It’s boxing. They’ve gotta box, and Paro is going to come at you. He has hunger, and I hope one day I get the opportunity to fight him, because I think that would be a head-on fight and I would love that. I grew up watching that [type of fighting].”
Tris Dixon covered his first amateur boxing fight in 1996. The former editor of Boxing News, he has written for a number of international publications and newspapers, including GQ and Men’s Health, and is a board member for the Ringside Charitable Trust and the Ring of Brotherhood. He has been a broadcaster for TNT Sports and hosts the popular “Boxing Life Stories” podcast. Dixon is a British Boxing Hall of Famer, an International Boxing Hall of Fame elector, a BWAA award winner, and is the author of five boxing books, including “Damage: The Untold Story of Brain Trauma in Boxing” (shortlisted for the William Hill Sportsbook of the Year), “Warrior: A Champion’s Search for His Identity” (shortlisted for the Sunday Times International Sportsbook of the Year) and “The Road to Nowhere: A Journey Through Boxing’s Wastelands.” You can reach him @trisdixon on X and Instagram.
