By Steve Kim
So with Keith Thurman pulling out of his scheduled return to the ring on May 19th with a hand injury, the likes of Shawn Porter are now forced to wait even longer to fight for the WBC welterweight title.
Porter, who lost a narrow decision to Thurman in the summer of 2016, defeated Andre Berto last year in what was sanctioned as a WBC final eliminator for a mandatory title shot.
Porter (28-2-1, 17 KOs) capped off his 2017 by decisioned the game Adrian Granados in November for the WBC silver title.
Kenny Porter, the trainer/manager for his son, stated to BoxingScene.com - "I don't know what's going to happen but I need some answers from the WBC to find out how long they are planning on sitting back and letting this guy (Thurman) hold the belt hostage and also I need some answers from the WBC why Shawn is no longer rated number one and you moved Danny Garica to number one?
"Danny was inactive for a year and then he came back and fought a fighter (Brandon Rios) who hadn't been relevant in a number of years and beat him."
Garcia knocked out Brandon Rios in nine rounds on February 17th at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas in what was his first outing since losing to Thurman last March.
"Shawn fought a title eliminator, beats Andre Berto and winning the title eliminator Shawn came back and fought again, which at that point we were asking to fight Danny Garcia for the interim title but Danny Garcia never stepped up to take the fight."
As Porter mentioned, Garcia and his son are now the two top rated 147-pounders in the WBC and Mauricio Sulaiman has stated that the two could soon meet for the WBC interim title.
Steve Kim is the news editor for BoxingScene.com.
