Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis looks sickly this week, draining down to 147 to make weight for his fight against Eimantas Stanionis this Saturday night. In comparison, WBA welterweight champion Stanionis (15-0, 9 KOs) looks normal and almost filled out.
Starved Appearance
Ennis looks like he’s been at one of the Civil War prisoner camps where food and clean water were a rarity. He looked starved in appearance.
IBF welterweight champion Boots Ennis’ appearance is similar to the way Devin Haney used to look when he was fighting at lightweight and was putting his health at risk trying to make the 135-lb limit.
Ennis (33-0, 29 KOs) needs to think seriously about moving up to 154 because he looks like he’s killing himself just to have the size advantage over his opponents at welterweight. Understandably, Ennis has chosen to stay at 147 because if he moved up to 154 to fight Vergil Ortiz Jr, he could have gotten exposed. It doesn’t have to be this way.
Ennis is choosing to stay at 147 rather than move up, where he should be campaigning in the junior middleweight division.
“Consistent hard jab,” said Chris Algieri to YSM Sports Media about the kind of jab that WBA welterweight champion Eimantas Stanionis throws. “He hits you in the chest. He tries to punch through you with that shot. He comes in fantastic condition always. This is a great matchup and one that I’m extremely excited about.”
Ennis blamed his poor performance against Karen Chukhadzhian on being drained by the IBF’s rehydration rule last November. However, he looks just as emaciated this week, making weight for the Stanionis fight. Ennis’s head looks too big for his body, and his ribcage and midsection look shrunken from a lack of food and water. His appearance is that of someone who has been starved.
“Yeah, it’s a damn good fight and the guy [Stanionis] is dangerous, and he’s definitely the #2 guy behind Boots,” said Algieri. “The fans don’t know how good Stanionis is. They don’t know him. His profile is not that big, but he’s a world titleist, a world champion. It’s going to be a unification bout. That makes it that much more important.
“Yes, he [Ennis] got a lot of flak because of the Karen [Chukhadzhian] fight; the two Karen fights really, and what he said in the ring afterwards. I hate post-fight interviews. You got a guy that just went 12 rounds. He’s exhausted,” said Algieri.
Ortiz Jr. Avoided?
Ennis should have moved up to 154 and accepted the offer for the mega-payday WBC interim 154-lb champion Vergil Ortiz Jr. for the February 22nd card. He looked so bad against Chukhadzhian in his last fight on November 9th.
It would have made perfect sense to move because he could have taken some of the heat off him for his performance against Karen by saying he was weight drained. Fans can only come to one conclusion for why Boots didn’t accept the fight against Vergil Jr. The fear was too much for him.
“He got punched in the head a whole bunch of times, and he [Boots] was struggling to make the weight,” said Algiei. “He said some things about the weight, which led to people thinking the Vergil Ortiz fight was going to happen. That fight was being talked about, and I just believe he had a change of heart for what he should be doing on 147.
“I’ve always said he should stay at 147 and try and unify that division. He’s good enough to be the guy at 147 and then move up. It’s time to move up,” said Algieri about Jaron Ennis.
