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Mike CoppingerESPN
The welterweight fight between Vergil Ortiz Jr. and Eimantas Stanionis, scheduled for April 29 in Arlington, Texas, has been postponed after Ortiz was forced to withdraw with an unspecified medical issue, sources told ESPN.
The 147-pound fight is expected to be rescheduled for this summer, sources said. It was originally set for March 18 but was delayed after Stanionis underwent an emergency appendectomy in his native Lithuania in January.
Ortiz, one of boxing’s fastest-rising stars, was forced to postpone a fight with Michael McKinson last March after he was hospitalized with rhabdomyolysis, a breakdown of muscle tissue that releases the damaging protein myoglobin into the blood, which can lead to kidney damage. Ortiz went on to score a ninth-round TKO of McKinson in August.
Oritz’s promoter, Golden Boy, won the rights to the WBA “regular” welterweight title fight with a bid of $2.3 million. Stanionis won the secondary title with a split-decision victory over Radzhab Butaev in April and is entitled to 75% of the winning bid, while Ortiz will earn much more than the $575,000 he’s set to make via the purse bid.
The bout shapes up as a coin-flip matchup between two pressure fighters in one of boxing’s best weight classes.
Ortiz (19-0, 19 KOs) is rated No. 4 by ESPN at welterweight. The 25-year-old, who fights out of the Dallas-Fort Worth area, broke through last year with a pair of stoppage wins over Maurice Hooker and Egidijus Kavaliauskas.
Stanionis (14-0, 9 KOs) is ESPN’s No. 6 boxer at 147 pounds. The 28-year-old also owns a win over Thomas Dulorme.