WBA to strip Guillermo Rigondeaux of 122lb world title

The sanctioning body had made a special exception to allow him to face Vasyl Lomachenko this past weekend.

The WBA has confirmed to ESPN Deportes that they will indeed move forward with their plans to strip Guillermo Rigondeaux of his 122lb world title after moving up to 130lbs to challenge Vasyl Lomachenko, and falling well short.

While Rigondeaux was not competing in the weight class where he held a world title, the WBA had given Rigondeaux a special exemption to allow his fight with Lomachenko to happen after they ordered Rigondeaux to rematch Moises Flores. Rigondeaux had knocked out Flores in a mandatory title defense in June with a punch that landed after the round had ended, ultimately resulting in a no contest.

The WBA states that they came to this resolution with Rigondeaux before the fight and if he had lost to Lomachenko he would also lose his title, and if he had won they would give him five days to decide if he wanted to return to 122lbs to defend his belt.

Rigondeaux would, of course, go on to lose badly to Lomachenko — so badly that he refused to come out of his corner for the seventh round, complaining of what he said was a broken hand. Rigondeaux would be evaluated and have x-rays taken of the hand after the fight, but the results revealed no fractures. It was then determined that Rigondeaux had only bruised the hand.

"As the resolution said, Rigondeaux will be stripped," WBA president Gilberto Mendoza wrote in an e-mail. "That was in the resolution, and what follows is that as soon as Daniel Román makes his defense of the world title, he’s going to defend it against Moisés 'Chucky' Flores to leave only one champion."