Jai Opetaia respects his IBF cruiserweight title and wants to unify the other belts, but says The Ring championship he holds makes him the best in his division. (Photo by Mark Robinson/Getty Images)
Jai Opetaia’s name has been floated as an attractive potential option for the winner of an upcoming cruiserweight title unification match.
Steps will have to be taken if he prefers that more attractive option than the one now on his plate.
The Ring has confirmed that Sydney’s Opetaia has been tasked with defending his IBF cruiserweight title against Huseyin Cinkara. The two sides have been ordered by the sanctioning body to enter into negotiations for their mandatory title fight.
Opetaia (26-0, 20 knockouts) is The Ring champion and IBF title holder. He has yet to make a mandatory defense of either of his two alphabet titles. In fact, his failure to comply with a previous order forced him to be stripped of the belt last December.
Cinkara (22-0, 18 KOs) is unheralded but has taken the right steps to get his no. 1 ranking to earn. The 39-year-old from Istanbul, Turkey via Speyer, Germany defeated Armend Xhoxhaj (18-4, 9 KOs) via second round knockout in their IBF title eliminator on April 24. With the win, Cinkara was ranked as the no. 1 contender named.
Opetaia regained the belt three weeks later in a rematch win over former three-time titlist Mairis Briedis (28-3, 20 KOs) on May 18 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Their fight was a follow-up to Opetaia’s thrilling victory in July 2022 to lift The Ring Championship and IBF belt from Briedis.
The first victory came at a high price. Opetaia suffered a broken jaw and also underwent surgery for an unrelated shoulder injury. All told, it kept him out of the ring for 14 months. He has since racked up four RING Championship title defenses in a span of just 54 weeks.
However, his decision to face Ellis Zorro last December rather than Briedis—his mandatory challenger at the time—led to the end of his IBF reign.
The fight was his first of three in a row at the Riyadh Season circuit in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Opetaia’s second appearance in boxing’s latest incubator was his rematch against Briedis. They were due to meet in February under the originally scheduled Oleksandr Usyk-Tyson Fury undisputed heavyweight championship. The entire show was delayed by three months when Fury (34-1-1, 24 KOs) suffered a reduction in sparring and was forced to postpone the anticipated clash.
Their second act also outdid the lot, with Opetaia picking up a well-deserved decision in their vacant title fight.
Opetaia has since defended his championship in an October 12 sixth round knockout of Jack Massey on the Artur Beterbiev-Dmitrii Bivol undercard.
The scheduled mandatory fight comes just four weeks after the Gilberto ‘Zurdo’ Ramirez-Chris Billam Smith WBA/WBO unification bout in Riyadh. It was loosely rumored that the winner would be ready to further unite against Opetaia.
However, there is still a lot of work to be done to get to that destination.
