NEW YORK – After three straight knockout wins, Junior Younan is hoping to get some senior-level opposition for his next fight.
The 30-year-old super middleweight contender Youman tells BoxingScene that, if he had his way, he would like to be standing across the ring from WBA interim super middleweight titleholder Jose Armando Resendiz next. Resendiz, 16-2 (11 KOs), is coming off his biggest win to date – a split decision over former champion Caleb Plant in May.
“I want something big. I want something meaningful,” said Younan, 22-0-1 (14 KOs), of Brooklyn, New York, at Thursday’s media workout at Gleason’s Gym for the Danny Garcia-Danny Gonzalez fight. “I think it's time. I paid my dues. I took the fights I needed to take.
“If I could pick anybody in the world, it would be Jose Armando Resendiz.
“He beat the guy. Caleb is one of those top guys, and now he has the WBA interim, and I want that belt.”
Joe DeGuardia, whose Star Boxing company promotes Younan, said he has been in communication with Premier Boxing Champions, which represents Resendiz, and is hoping that fight can be made next.
“I love the matchup,” DeGuardia said. “I’ve been speaking to them, trying to get that fight. I spoke to PBC about it – it’s a fight I’d love to have.
“We’re looking for something big. I’m trying to get him, I want to get him a title or a fight to go to the world title. I think he’s ready for it.”
Younan’s father-trainer Sherif Younan is also all-in on the matchup.
“We want Resendiz,” Sherif Younan said. “We would show the world how easy we beat him. I don’t think he goes five rounds with Junior. Junior would sleep him easily.
“There’s levels to this. Nothing against Caleb, but I think his time has passed and his chin got soft after the Canelo [Alvarez] and [David] Benavidez beatings. He, too, can get it. But Resendiz makes all the sense.”
Younan, a pro since 2013, is coming off a first-round knockout win over Luka Loza last month. It was his first fight in more than a year, though he was supposed to fight in March as well. That fight was nixed after his opponent, Ecuador’s Abel Mina, refused to leave his hotel room to attend the weigh-in. Younan says that his promoter, DeGuardia, went as far as going up to Mina’s dressing room with cash in hand, but Mina still wasn’t interested.
“It was horrible because I was finally starting to get really active again,” Junior Younan said. “It's been a while since I had that type of activity, and I only get better when I get to that point of fighting and training at that rate.”
Junior Younan also commented on the biggest event to take place in the super middleweight division in years: Terence Crawford’s unanimous decision win over Alvarez to win the undisputed championship. Younan believes Crawford will step down a division to try to become undisputed in an unprecedented fourth division.
“I think he cleared up the landscape. I think he vacates and goes to 60, in my opinion. I think that's what happens. I've been reading stuff about Zhanibek [Alimkhanuly] and [Erislandy] Lara, and then [Crawford] fighting somebody else, and then the winner of that fights for undisputed. To be four-time undisputed, I think that's what Bud goes for.”
Star Boxing will return on November 22 at the Paramount Theatre in Huntington, New York, with local favorites Tyrone James and Harley Burke in separate fights.
Ryan Songalia is a reporter and editor for BoxingScene.com and has written for ESPN, the New York Daily News, Rappler, The Guardian, Vice and The Ring magazine. He holds a Master’s degree in Journalism from the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism and is a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America. He can be reached at ryansongalia@gmail.com or on Twitter at @ryansongalia.
