Jermell Charlo: I Made History Before; It Feels Good, I Know That Feeling

Jermell Charlo loves the idea of doing something that nobody else has been able to achieve.

The rare occurrence of a matchup between two undisputed champions will see Charlo move up two divisions to challenge super middleweight king Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez. He is a sizeable underdog ahead of their September 30 clash in Las Vegas, but likes his chances to once again etch his name in the record books.  

“I made history before,” Charlo told Showtime’s Brian Custer during the Terence Crawford-Errol Spence Pay-Per-View event at T-Mobile Arena, where he will challenge Alvarez in two months. “It feels good. I know that feeling. I know that urge, that feeling, that hunger.

“I want my kids to be able to say ‘My dad was able to do something no boxer has ever done.’ That was to move up two weight divisions to become undisputed in two weight divisions.”

Alvarez (59-2-2, 39KOs) has campaigned at super middleweight or heavier since his November 2019 knockout win over Sergey Kovalev to win the WBO light heavyweight title. He went on to fully unify the super middleweight division before a failed bid to unseat WBA light heavyweight titlist Dmitry Bivol last May, ending a pound-for-pound run that saw him claim Fighter of the Year honors twice in a three-year span. He has since returned to super middleweight to twice successfully defend his undisputed championship.

Charlo (35-1-1, 19KOs) has never weighed more than 155 ½ pounds through nearly sixteen pro years. While the naturally bigger fighter, Charlo has maintained a tight three-pound range for more than a decade. His weight of 152 ¾ for his tenth-round knockout of Brian Castano to fully unify the junior middleweight division was the lightest of his nine career title fights.

The win over Castano In their rematch last May 14 marked the first undisputed 154-pound since Ronald ‘Winky’ Wright eighteen years prior and the first since the WBO was universally regarded as the sport’s fourth major title. A victory in September will see him do what Katie Taylor failed to achieve in boxing’s only other meeting between four-belt undisputed champions—entering as a reigning, fully unified champ to dethrone another at a higher weight.

“That’s the dream. It’s beyond a dream,” admitted Charlo, who is viewed as an early +265 underdog according to bet365 sportsbook. “Some people can barely get to undisputed.

“Now I have the opportunity to do it in two weight divisions. I have to seize that golden opportunity.”

Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox