Another date change has come with the Joseph Diaz-William Zepeda fight.
The latest update also comes with a home for the excellent light crossroads brawl.
BoxingScene.com has confirmed that Diaz-Zepeda will now take place on October 29 at Pechanga Arena in San Diego, California. The latest change, which was confirmed by Golden Boy Promotions on Thursday, marks the third single date attached to the fight, which has moved from November 5 to 19, back to November 5 and now to the last weekend of October.
The new fight date momentarily conflicts with an earlier, and perhaps premature, announcement made by Fernando Beltrán, director of Zanfer Boxing, who insisted that Jaime Munguia (40-0, 32KOs) would headline the October 29 show at Pechanga Sand. An opponent was confirmed for the former WBO junior middleweight champion, despite speculation that he would next face England’s John Ryder. Neither DAZN nor Golden Boy co-signed Beltran’s ad, which remains in limbo as it goes live.
Golden Boy is now armed with major fight nights on back-to-back weekends. The new date places the fight a week before the WBA light heavyweight title fight between current champion Dmitry Bivol (20-0, 11KOs) and undefeated mandatory challenger Gilberto ‘Zurdo’ Ramirez (44-0, 30KOs). ), which will take place in November. 5 in Abu Dhabi. Golden Boy promotes RamÃrez and DÃaz, although he was never in the cards for both fights to share a bill.
The adjustment will leave Diaz (32-2-1, 15KOs) out of the ring for just 11 months instead of nearly a full year. The former IBF junior lightweight champion has not fought since a competitive but clear points loss to Devin Haney in their fight for the WBC lightweight title last December 4 in Las Vegas. Since then, Haney has amassed all of the lightweight titles in a twelve-round win over George Kambosos in their undisputed clash last June in Melbourne, Australia.
Diaz fell short in his quest to become a two-division champion, though he did at least enjoy a three-fight campaign in 2021.
He began the year losing his IBF 130-pound belt on the scale after dropping the weight before an eventual twelve-round draw with Shavkat Rakhimov last February in Indio, California. Diaz then moved up to lightweight in short order, replacing Ryan Garcia in a clash with Javier Fortuna, whom he outpointed last July 9 in Los Angeles.
The win over Fortuna set up a planned showdown with Garcia, who pulled out due to a hand/wrist injury that led Diaz to seek a shot at Haney’s WBC title fight. The active 2021 campaign came on the heels of a 13-month gap between fights throughout his career for Diaz, who is now headed to another dangerous assignment following an extended period of unwanted inactivity.
Zepeda emerged as a lightweight to watch following a fifth-round knockout of Roberto Ramirez, with the December 2020 clash in Hollywood marking his United States debut. It was followed by his best win to date, a mercy stoppage of then-undefeated Hector Tanajara after six one-sided rounds last July 9 at Banc of California Stadium in Los Angeles.
The same show saw Diaz outpoint Fortuna in his lightweight debut.
The victories over Ramirez and Tanajara served as part of a fifteen-fight knockout streak for Zepeda, a 26-year-old southpaw from San Mateo, Mexico. That streak came to an end when he was forced to go the distance of ten rounds in a unanimous decision victory over former 130-pound champion Rene Alvarado on May 14 in Ontario, California.
Zepeda arguably represents the toughest test for any top lightweight, though he faces his best opponent by far, Diaz. The fight’s initial announcement was well received by the boxing community, with the most recent round of changes delivering the fight a week earlier than originally expected.
Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox
