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By Dan Ambrose: The WBO has adjusted their ranking at 140 by moving Jose Ramirez to #4 and moving Teofimo Lopez from #2 to #4.
The #3 spot is occupied by the recently beaten Jack Catterall, who had hoped to get moved up after his questionable 12-round split decision defeat against undisputed champion Josh Taylor last February
WBO’s new top 4 rankings:
1. Liam Paro
2. Jose Ramirez
3. Jack Catterall
4. Teofimo Lopez
Catterall (26-1, 13 KOs) is obviously not happy about not being moved up to the #2 spot, which would assure him of a fight for the WBO title against #1 Liam Paro after Josh Taylor vacates his titles to go up to 147.
It’s difficult to make an argument for Catterall deserving of the #2 spot in the WBO’s rankings because he’s never beaten anyone of note during his career. Catterall’s best win came against fringe contender Ohara Davies. In contrast, Jose Ramirez’s best career wins have come against these solid fighters:
- Jose Zepeda
- Maurice Hooker
- Viktor Postol
- Jose Pedraza
- Amir Imam
- Antonio Orozco
- Mike Reed
- Manuel Perez
You can argue that half of those fighters would beat Catterall without many problems, so it doesn’t make sense to have him ranked above Ramirez.
For the World Boxing Organization, it makes sense for them to have moved former WBC/WBO 140-lb champion Ramirez (27-1, 17 KOs) into the #2 spot in place of the recently beaten Teofimo Lopez.
Ramirez is coming off an important 12-round unanimous decision win over Jose Pedraza last March, and before that, he lost a close decision against Josh Taylor.
That victory over Pedraza should be more than enough for Ramirez to deserve the #2 position over both Teofimo and Catterall (26-1, 13 KOs), given that they’re both coming off 12-round split decision defeats.
Teofimo Lopez is in a good place at #4 in the WBO’s rankings because he needs to get his health and head together after his loss to George Kambosos Jr. last November.
Given his injuries and his poor showing against Kambosos, it wouldn’t be a good idea for Teofimo to be rated #2 with the WBO because he might be in a good place physically & mentally to take on a tough fighter like Paro for soon to be vacated 140-lb strap.
The last thing Teofimo needs right now is pressure to fight someone good that is going to force him to fight at 100% capacity. Once Teofimo gets back in there and shows that he can function like before, he can slowly build himself into a position to fight for a world title.
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