On May 6, Naoya Inoue will make the first defense of his undisputed super bantamweight championship against Luis Nery at the Tokyo Dome. At 31 years old and with 26 fights under his belt, “The Monster” is a pound-for-pound superstar and four-weight world champion.
LOOK: Naoya Inoue vs. Luis Nery, exclusively on ESPN+
In April 2014, Inoue won the WBC light flyweight title at the expense of Adrián Hernández (TKO 6). Less than eight months later, the then-21-year-old jumped up the flyweight pision to defeat reigning WBO junior bantamweight champion Omar Narváez (TKO 2).
Between May 2018 and December 2022, Inoue focused on the bantamweight pision, defeating Emmanuel Rodríguez (TKO 2), Nonito Donaire (UD 12) and Paul Butler (TKO 11) on his way to becoming undisputed champion.
In his two most recent fights, the Japanese hero defeated Stephen Fulton (TKO 8) and Marlon Tapales (KO 11) to consolidate all the belts at 122 pounds.
It’s been incredible form… and Inoue shows no signs of slowing down.
Boxing history is full of great fighters who did almost impossible things when it came to weight pisions. The legendary Henry Armstrong held featherweight, lightweight and welterweight championships simultaneously. Manny Pacquiao conquered a record eight weight classes in the modern era. Meanwhile, Amanda Serrano holds the women’s record with championships in seven pisions.
When I spoke with Inoue for Ring magazine, shortly after he annihilated former unified bantamweight champion Juan Carlos Payano in 70 seconds, he had this to say about moving up the ladder, via translator Masa Ueda: “Right now, I can only “I see myself as tall as super bantamweight (122 pounds), but if I go up and my body gets bigger, then I might go back up.”
Given that Inoue has claimed the undisputed super bantamweight championship after just two fights at that weight, it’s safe to say this fierce champion can go higher.
If he moves up to featherweight, then there will be huge challenges in the form of Luis Alberto Lopez, Raymond Ford and Rafael Espinoza. However, The Monster would open as a favorite against any of them.
Could the champion go higher than featherweight? That’s when things could get a little silly for the 5-5 ½ Inoue. WBC super featherweight champion O’Shaquie Foster is 5-8 with a reach of 72 inches. If that’s not difficult enough, IBF champion Joe Cordina is 5-9 with a reach of 69 inches. Physical advantages like this can be very difficult to overcome. After all, weight classes exist for a reason.
LOOK: Naoya Inoue vs. Luis Nery, exclusively on ESPN
The aforementioned Manny Pacquiao overcame enormous physical advantages to claim world titles from flyweight to super welterweight. However, Pacquiao’s incredible volume of punches and foot speed allowed him to overwhelm much larger opponents.
Inoue, as great a fighter as he is, has a completely different style than Pacquiao and is by no means guaranteed to be effective against much bigger men.
But no matter which pision Inoue stops at, fans can be sure of one thing: The Monster will be there to do some serious damage.
