Boxing

Bruce Carrington Calls For Title Shot After Stoppage Win

Bruce Carrington is ready for the champions at featherweight after his stoppage win over Jose Enrique Vivas.

Nathaniel Marrero

Bruce Carrington
Bruce Carrington / IMAGO/Newscom World

Any doubts about whether Bruce Carrington is ready for a world title shot were emphatically answered on Saturday night.

Carrington earned arguably the most impressive win of his career with a third-round stoppage of Jose Enrique Vivas. Vivas hadn't been stopped before in his career before facing Carrington.

Carrington (15-0, 9 KOs) dropped Vivas with a big right hand in the second round and followed it up with a barrage that could have warranted referee Raul Caiz Jr. stopping the fight, but Vivas (23-4, 12 KOs) made it to the end of the round. Vivas didn't survive long into the third round, though, as a few more big shots from Carrington caused Caiz Jr. to stop the fight.

After the win, Carrington called out three of the four champions at featherweight; Nick Ball (WBA), Stephen Fulton (WBC) and Rafael Espinoza (WBO).

"Nick Ball, I want that," Carrington said. "I want that. Stephen Fulton, yeah, I want that. Let's get this work in bro. I want to fight all of y'all. Let's get it...Stop running [and] stop playing.

Of the three champions, a fight with Espinoza (26-0, 22 KOs) would likely be the easiest to make with both fighters being promoted by Top Rank. One could make a strong case that it's the best fight that can be made at featherweight given their dynamic styles.

"I'll chop that tree down too," Carrington said of Espinoza. "I've been here. I've been saying his name since last year. Stop playing. Listen, you gotta ask him the question if he wants to fight me. That's the real question. I've been saying I've been wanting to fight everybody. I'm not ducking nobody. Y'all some champions, y'all call yourself champions, come fight the best."

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Carrington is ranked No. 1 by the WBC and WBO, No. 2 by the WBA and No. 4 by the IBF. Angelo Leo (25-1, 12 KOs) is the IBF champion.

Regardless of the path Carrington chooses to take, he's knocking on the doorstep of a title shot and his win over Vivas proved he's ready for the best of the best at 126 pounds. And if his performance on Saturday was a sign of things to come, Carrington could end up being the best of the bunch.

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Nathaniel Marrero
NATHANIEL MARRERO

Nathaniel Marrero is a writer for the Boxing, Pittsburgh Pirates and Baltimore Ravens On SI sites. He's also written for the Orlando Sentinel and MLB.com, and was a part of UCF's sports show, Hitting The Field. He attended UCF and graduated with a bachelor's degree in journalism in 2023. Twitter/X: Nate_Marrero