All that is left for Jamel Herring and Carl Frampton is to enter the ring.
Both boxers easily made weight ahead of their oft-postponed WBO junior lightweight title fight, which takes place on Saturday, live on ESPN+ beginning at 4:00 p.m. ET from Caesars Palace Dubai in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
Herring (22-2, 10KOs) weighed 129.4 pounds for the third defense of his title reign, while Frampton (28-2, 16KOs) weighed 129.8 pounds in his bid to become the first-ever three-division champion from anywhere on the island of Ireland.
The bout was originally due to take place last June in Frampton’s hometown of Belfast, Northern Ireland, only for the pandemic to cancel such plans. Additional dates for last December in Las Vegas, this past January and Feb. 27th in London were scrapped for a variety of reasons before finally landing on this Saturday in Dubai.
Herring most recently defended in a disqualification win over Jonathan Oquendo after eight rounds this past September in Las Vegas. The 35-year-old from the Coram section of Long Island, New York—who now lives in Cincinnati and splits training between Omaha, Nebraska and Colorado City—won the belt with a 12-round unanimous decision win over Japan’s Masayuki Ito in May 2019.
Frampton was a unified junior featherweight titlist and held the WBA belt at featherweight, currently serving as Belfast’s only-ever two-division titlist and just one of three (along with Steve Collins and Katie Taylor) from anywhere in Ireland to have accomplished the feat. His featherweight reign began with a win over then-unbeaten Leo Santa Cruz in July 2016, five months after outpointing bitter rival Scott Quigg in their Feb. 2016 unification clash between unbeaten titlists.
A Jan. 2017 loss to Santa Cruz marked Frampton’s last days with a belt around his waist, coming up well short in a competitive but clear defeat to then-unbeaten IBF featherweight titlist Josh Warrington in Dec. 2018. Two wins at junior lightweight have followed, including a 7th round stoppage of Darren Traynor last August at York Hall in Bethnal Green, England.
The evening’s chief support pits unbeaten junior lightweight contender Zhankosh Turarov (24-0, 17KOs) and Belfast’s Tyrone McKenna (21-2-1, 6KOs) in a 10-round regional title fight. McKenna weighed 139.6 pounds, while Kazakhstan’s Turarov—who is now based out of Pahokee, Florida—was due to weigh in later after it was revealed that he was slightly over the limit.
Below are the weights for bouts which will air on the ESPN+ preliminary undercard beginning at 2:00 p.m. ET.
Donnie Nietes (42-1-5, 23KOs), Bacolod City, Philippines, 114.9 pounds vs. Pablo Carrillo (25-7-1, 16KOs), Barranquilla, Colombia, 114.6 pounds—10 rounds, junior bantamweight
Keyshawn Davis (1-0, 1KO), Norfolk, Virginia, 138.2 pounds vs. Richman Ashelley (10-1, 9KOs), Accra, Ghana, 136 pounds—6 rounds, junior welterweight
Tursynbay Kulakhmet (2-0, 1KO), Kyzylorda, Kazakhstan, 153.9 pounds vs. Heber Rondon (20-0, 13KOs), Los Teques, Venezuela, 153.7 pounds—10 rounds, junior middleweight
Below are the weights for bouts which will take place on the undercard before the ESPN+ stream goes live.
Faizan Anwar (5-0, 4KOs), Calcutta, India, 148.2 pounds vs. Evgenii Vazem (9-13, 4KOs), Stary Oskol, Russia, 146.8 pounds—6 rounds, welterweight
Fahad Al Bloushi (3-1, 1KO), Dubai, 130 pounds vs. Suraj (2-1, 1KO), India, 129.6 pounds—4 rounds, junior lightweight
Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox