Xander Zayas will look to unify junior middleweight titles against Abass Baraou this weekend. This is not a placeholder fight, and it is not staged in the shadow of a scheduled superfight. This happens because belts are up for grabs and the division keeps moving whether its two biggest names ever share a ring.
Unification does not stop for negotiations elsewhere. It changes who must act next and who can afford to wait.
Zayas is still young and still developing, but his career is not on hold while talks drag on longer than expected. Baraou is not coming to make up the numbers. He earned his title by upsetting Yoenis Tellez and forcing the issue late, including a knockdown that removed any doubt. It’s a real fight with real consequences in a division that continues to reshape itself while its head-to-head battle remains unresolved.
On the upside, Ennis and Ortiz continue to exist as an idea rather than an event. Ortiz’s legal dispute with Golden Boy added friction to an already slow process. There is no fixed timeline, no signed date, and no guarantee that the landscape that awaits them will look the same if an agreement is finally reached.
Patience from the outside can quietly turn into a losing position within the sport. Divisions do not stop functioning while negotiating marquee battles. Tires move. Mandatory positions moved. Fighters age in and out of favor.
Junior middleweight is deep enough to absorb that lag. It doesn’t have to stop working to protect the idea of ​​a perfect fight. Zayas vs. Baraou is not presented as an answer to everything. This shows that the division continues to function while its greatest attack remains theoretical.
If Ennis and Ortiz meet, the fight will still carry weight. The longer it remains on paper, the less accurate it becomes to treat everything else as secondary.
The division has already moved once. It might not wait to move again.
