After WBA Bantamweight World Champion Joshua Franco and WBA Super Champ Juan Francisco Estrada were granted a 24-hour period to come to an agreement for the mandated match and avoid purse bids, an agreement was not reached and the bout went to purse bids and was won by Golden Boy early on Tuesday. It appears the fight will take place in either June or July with a few locations being discussed including Nevada, California, or Franco's hometown of San Antonio.
The situation begins to get cloudy as the lower than anticipated purse bids may cause Estrada to walk away from the fight and vacate the "super" version of the belt. That would likely leave a fight between Franco and legendary four-division world champ Chocloatito Gonzalez who is ranked number one in the division by the WBA. As confusing as this all sounds it could actually end up being a home run for San Antonio fight fans and a dream come true for the brothers. Matchroom Boxing, which promotes Bam Rodriguez, is headed by Eddie Hearn, who has openly discussed the possibility of staging a massive doubleheader with Franco plus WBC junior bantamweight titlist Rodriguez. Rodriguez is scheduled to take on former world champ Srisaket sor Rungvisai. A doubleheader featuring the two brothers would be a massive draw and could realistically dwarf the roughly 15,000 seats that the Ryan Garica sold for his April 9th, fight in the Alamodome.
The brothers have not fought in San Antonio on the same card yet. With each brother holding a major world title, the timing does seem perfect. Especially when a massive card that could feature Franco vs Chocolatito and Rodriguez vs Sor Rungvisai would be a ticket sale and ratings bonanza. Franco sports a record of 18-1-2 (8), and has fought in the Alamo city just once he destroyed and stopped Jose Alejandro Burgos in January of 2020 on the undercard of Mungia-O'Sullivan. Rodriguez, 15-0 (10) scored a sensational knockout of Cesar Garcia Torrijos, on a TMB card in nearby Floresville in 2019 and a year early on a Mikey Garcia promoted card Rodriguez scored a first-round knockout of Santiago Sanchez Bayardo of Corpus Christi, at the Mi Mercado Event Center, on the west-side of San Antonio.
Rodriguez confirmed that he was being scheduled to fight around the same time “I haven’t heard anything yet but I know I’m going to be fighting sometime around June,” Rodriguez said and went on to confirm "They’re working on a doubleheader with me and my brother. Franco, confirmed his little brother's sentiment adding “There have been talks of the fight coming here [San Antonio] and my brother being on the show. That would be amazing. We’re confident it will come here.” There are still plenty of details to work out and some things that have to fall in place but it seems like a realistic possibility at the moment.