San Antonio's favorite son and the future of boxing, particularly in the smaller weight classes, Jesse "Bam" Rodriguez, is set to return! The Alamo City native will look to become a two-weight division world champion as he battles with Cristian Gonzalez On April 8th at the Boeing Center at the Tech Port Arena on the city's west side. Rodriguez, 17-0 (1), recently vacated his WBC Super Flyweight belt, which he successfully defended two times to move back down to his more natural weight class. Rodriguez recently turned 23 years old and became the first-ever world champion born in the 2000s last year. He captured that crown by taking apart Carlos Cuadras in Phoenix, Arizona last year. Bam last fought in his home city in June of last year when he gave a career-best performance in absolutely destroying the legendary Srisaket Sor Rungvisai, and sending the future hall of famer into retirement.
Bam will look to become a two-division world champ as he moves down to flyweight to take on Cristian Gonzalez, 15-1 (5) of Tultitlán, México for the vacant WBO belt that was vacated by Japanese star Junto Nakatani. The two had previously been linked to a possible fight however, Nakatani decided to move up to 115 and Rodriguez down to his more natural weight of 112.
Rodriguez last fought in the co-main event of Canelo-GGG 3 and took a points victory over Israel Gonzalez back on September 17th. Cristian Gonzalez, no relation, will have been inactive for over a year when he steps in with the Texan on April 8th and has fought just one round in nearly a year-and-a-half. His last outing was in March of 2022, and he scored a first-round KO over Juan Alejo Zuniga in Mexico City.
Should Rodriguez get the victory, which he is expected to, he will have lots of big fights in front of him for the rest of 2023 and could be in contention for Fighter of the Year again this year. Co-promoter Eddie Hearn said, “ It’s a great fight that sets up all the big fights, a unification with Julio Cesar Martinez, a unification against Sunny Edwards. There are some great fights to be made in the flyweight division,”
Tickets go on pre-sale on February 9th and go on sale to the public on February 10th.