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Eimantas Stanionis Sidelined For Ortiz Bout With Appendicitis

Eimantas Stanionis Sidelined For Ortiz Bout With Appendicitis

Boxing News

Eimantas Stanionis Sidelined For Ortiz Bout With Appendicitis

Sean Michael Ham- PBC

Eimantas Stanionis Sidelined For Ortiz Bout With Appendicitis

Eimantas Stanionis, the WBA secondary welterweight titlist, had an emergency appendectomy on Friday, which has forced his mandatory defense against Vergil Ortiz Jr. to be postponed, Stanionis manager Shelly Finkel told Fight Freaks Unite on Saturday.

The fight was due to headline a Golden Boy card on March 18 (DAZN) at a location to be determined in Ortiz’s home region of Dallas, but the fight had not yet been formally announced.

Finkel said the hope it to reschedule the bout to take place sometime in April.

“It’s a drag and it’s disappointing for everyone but thankfully it’s not serious,” Finkel said. “Hopefully, we can get a date in April.”

Finkel said when he tried to call Stanionis on Friday he could not reach him, which he said was unusual.

“I couldn’t reach him and then his finance called me an hour or two later and said he was coming out of surgery,” Finkel said. “I was like what?! And she told me what happened.”

Hear us updating all of the fight news to start 2023 and previewing the Saturday night Gervonta Davis-Hector Luis Garcia PPV showdown on the “Big Fight Weekend Podcast” by clicking below,

The winner of the fight between the unbeaten boxers with good power and exciting styles will be mandated to next face WBA “super” titleholder Errol Spence Jr., a three-belt titlist, although Spence is likely to first face WBC mandatory challenger and former unified titlist Keith Thurman when he returns in the spring.

Stanionis (14-0, 9 KOs), 28, of Lithuania, and Ortiz (19-0, 19 KOs), 24, of Grand Prairie, Texas, were both limited to just one fight apiece in 2022.

Stanionis won the belt by action-packed split decision over Radzhab Butaev in April. Ortiz dominated and knocked out Michael McKinson in the ninth round in August.

Golden Boy, which promotes Ortiz and has a deal with DAZN, won the purse bid in mid-December for $2.3 million to beat an offer of $2,100,100 made by TGB Promotions.

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Since 2000, award-winning reporter Dan Rafael has covered boxing full time and been ringside for thousands of fights, first for five years at USA Today and then for 15 years at ESPN, where he wrote and appeared on various television, radio and streaming programs. In 2013, Dan was honored by the Boxing Writers Association of America with the Nat Fleischer award for career excellence in boxing journalism. Dan brings his great insight to the Big Fight Weekend site, podcast and more!

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