Donaire, Walters dispute WBA ‘feather’ title today

NONITO Donaire Jr. and Jamaican Nicholas Walters both tipped the scales at 125.6 pounds in yesterday’s weigh-in. MARC ANTHONY REYES

CARSON, California—At the crossroads of his career, Nonito Donaire Jr. surprised his fans and critics by taking a path he normally wouldn’t take. On Saturday night (Sunday morning in Manila), he will have to get by a hungry and menacing opponent in Jamaican Nicholas Walters.

Seen by just about everybody as the riskiest fight of  his career, Donaire will try to show if he can magically re-boot a career that took a tumble last year when he clashes against the undefeated Walters for the undisputed WBA featherweight title at the StubHub Center here.

While throngs of fans praised his crafty boxing style and brutal left hook, Donaire also earned almost an equal share of detractors who claimed his previous conquests that put him up there in every pound-for-pound list were carefully chosen for him by Top Rank.

This time, Top Rank big boss Bob Arum and even  his former chief trainer Robert Garcia say Donaire is in for a rough and tough night against the hard-punching Walters who have decked 10 of his last 11 opponents.

Most boxing writers who are in this LA suburb have also predicted a win—others even by  KO—for the 28-year-old Walters (24-0-0 with 20 KOs). Online betting put Walters as favorite at -125, while Donaire is the slight underdog at +105.

Donaire and Walters both tipped the scale at 125.6 pounds at the official weigh-in held outdoors at high noon at the concourse of the famed sports complex. Organizers said StubHub will witness its biggest boxing crowd in history of approximately 10,000 spectators. They sold 300 more seats after all the tickets were sold out since last week.
The WBA recognizes Donaire as its ‘super’ featherweight champ and Walters as its regular feather titlist. Both won their titles last April in the same card with the Filipino Flash winning by unanimous technical decision over African champion Simpiwe Vetyeka and the Jamaican knocking out Vic Darchinyan.

During his Fighter of the Year run, the venue, then known as Home Depot Center, staged Donaire’s unanimous decision victory over a taller South African champion Jeffrey Mathebula in April. By October of the same year, he floored Japanese legend Toshiaki Nishioka.

“Hopefully, the third time will even be better,” said Donaire who got out of his usual talkative self for this fight and willingly left Walters to do all the prefight trash talk.

“From this point on, everything I have to say will be said inside that ring,” Donaire added.

“This is my dream fight. It’s now my time to show everyone who is the best 126 world champion,” said Walters. “He’s a  good fighter I can’t take that away from him. But he’s in my way and I have to take him out of my way for me to advance.”

Raul Caiz Jr. will be the third man on the ring, while the  judges are Adalaide Byrd, Steve Morrow and Tom Taylor.

The fight is co-mainer to the middleweight championship between Kazakh bundle of power Gennady Golovkin and Mexican Marco Antonio Rubio. Rubio had already lost the fight on the scale when he weighed 1.8 lb above the 160 limit.