American heavyweight hope to face biggest test in world title eliminator.
The American heavyweight was once a creature whose status was of least concern. It heavily populated the habitat in which it roamed, surviving and thriving with no natural predators to be wary of. It was, for all intents and purposes, the king of the food chain.
But then something happened. Something changed. The population dwindled. Through a variety of factors, the American heavyweight became threatened and its numbers fell.
All of a sudden, the American heavyweight is a critically endangered species.
That’s not to say that a few preserved specimens haven’t appeared over the last decade or so to let us all know that they were not gone just yet. Deontay Wilder showed up, all bombs and heavy artillery. He bowled guys over like he was angry that they had the gall to stand in front of him, like he had been created as the embodiment of the frustration America felt over its declining ranks of big men.
Just a year after Wilder won his title, in Charles Martin walked (in his own words, like a god) to pick up a belt of his own. He may have lost it at the hands of Anthony Joshua just over two months later, but it was a sign that the American heavyweight had truly made a return.
Just three years after Martin fell to Joshua, Andy Ruiz Jr. rocked up to rock the Londoner’s world. He stopped Joshua, and he even did it in America. It was like a reminder, a sign that though one American heavyweight had been defeated, another had come to take its place.
And for the briefest of moments, America had every heavyweight belt all to itself, just like it had done all those years ago.
Of course, Ruiz would lose to Joshua in the rematch, giving up the unified championship with little resistance. And then just two months later, Deontay Wilder would be separated from his title in brutally one-sided fashion by Tyson Fury.
Just like that, the American heavyweight was endangered once again.
Since then, we have seen other American heavyweights fight on the big stage. Jarrell Miller came in with all the cockiness and big words we’ve come to expect, but it didn’t stop him from getting halted by Daniel Dubois.
Jared Anderson seemed like the next big hope for America, but it was ironically a performance against Charles Martin himself that would have people start doubting just how good he was. Rather than a passing of the torch, it seemed there was no torch to be passed at all.
Then we saw Anderson get brutalised by Martin Bakole, and he hasn’t looked the same since.
One by one, they each were felled. So, what now?
Well, the American heavyweight isn’t gone just yet. You see, there is one more man to potentially restore hope, and that man is Richard Torrez Jr.
As announced by Premier Boxing Champions, Torrez (14-0, 12 KOs) will be facing Frank Sanchez (25-1, 18 KOs) on the undercard of the WBC super-welterweight title fight between Sebastian Fundora and Keith Thurman on the 28th of March.
Torrez’s best win to date came against Guido Vianello, which proved the hype around him for many. However, Sanchez is a world-ranked contender who is the only man to have beaten Efe Ajagba. A win for either will bring them one step closer to a shot at the IBF heavyweight title.
Is Richard Torrez Jr. what fans say he very well could be, or is the American heavyweight–like the dodo and the woolly mammoth–simply a species that is doomed to go extinct?
π¨ #ππ¨π‘ππ’π₯ππ§ππ¨π₯π ππ‘ π¨π‘πππ₯πππ₯π ππ‘π‘π’π¨π‘πππ ππ‘π§ π¨
π₯ Frank Sanchez vs. Richard Torrez Jr.
π₯ Yoenli Hernandez vs. Terrell Gausha
π₯ Elijah Garcia vs. Kevin Newman IIπ March 28
βΆοΈ PBC PPV on @PrimeVideo pic.twitter.com/JXAJtDP7zpβ Premier Boxing Champions (@premierboxing) February 18, 2026
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