NEW YORK — Nothing
George Kambosos Jr. has seen from
Richardson Hitchins intimidates the former unified lightweight champion.
His two 12-round, 135-pound championship clashes with Devin Haney have left Kambosos confident that he’ll handle Hitchins in their fight for the
IBF junior welterweight title Saturday night in The Theater at Madison Square Garden. Despite comparisons, Kambosos doesn’t think Hitchins is in Haney’s class.
Haney became boxing’s first undisputed lightweight champion in the four-belt era when he outboxed Kambosos three years ago at Marvel Stadium in Melbourne, Australia.
A more skilled Haney beat Kambosos in their first fight 118-110, 116-112 and 116-112. The Oakland, California, native won their rematch four months later by even wider distances on the cards at Rod Laver Arena in Melbourne (119-109, 118-110 and 118-110).
Haney (32-0, 15 KOs, 1 NC) later edged recently retired three-division champ
Vasiliy Lomachenko by unanimous decision to retain his Ring, IBF, WBA, WBC and WBO belts.
Kambosos (22-3, 10 KOs) doesn’t see anything on Hitchins’ record to indicate he compares favorably to Haney, whose rivalry with the latter continues to play out on social media.
“Obviously I’ve been in there with Haney 24 rounds — 24 good rounds with him,” Kambosos told
The Ring. “I think I get a little bit of a bad rap from them fights. I think when you actually study the fights, the first fight was a close fight. The second fight he had some great moments, but I had a lot more great moments as well. I landed some big shots on him. He took ‘em very well.
“But when you look at a guy like Haney and compare him to Hitchins, I don’t think Hitchins is one-tenth of a Devin Haney. He hasn’t fought anyone that jumps out at you, hasn’t beat anyone that jumps out at you, hasn’t showed anything but these basic things that he does. I’ll be the ultimate test of that, but I’m very excited for this fight and I know what I bring to the table. We’ll see what he brings June 14th.”
Hitchins (19-0, 7 KOs), of Brooklyn, N.Y., will make his first defense of the belt he won from another Australian, Liam Paro, on Dec. 7. He beat Paro (25-1, 15 KOs) by split decision in a fight he appeared to win convincingly at Roberto Clemente Coliseum in San Juan, Puerto Rico.
Hitchins’ most noteworthy win before he took Paro’s championship was a virtual shutout of veteran southpaw Jose Zepeda in September 2023 at Caribe Royale in Orlando, Florida. Zepeda was 37-3 when Hitchins beat him and had lost only to former junior welterweight champions
Regis Prograis and Jose Ramirez and former lightweight champ Terry Flanagan.
DraftKings lists Hitchins, a 2016 Haitian Olympian, as a 16-1 favorite over Kambosos, the No. 3-ranked contender by the IBF.
Kambosos beat late replacement Jake Wyllie by unanimous decision in his last fight, a 12-rounder March 22 at Qudos Bank Arena in Sydney, Australia.
Kambosos, 31, is a big underdog against Hitchins, 27, in part because he went 1-3 in his four bouts before his victory over Wyllie (17-2, 16 KOs, 1 NC), another native Australian.
The IBF clearly considered Kambosos’ losses came against elite-level competition when it ranked him high in the 140-pound division. In addition to the defeats to Haney, he lost by 11th-round TKO to Lomachenko (18-3, 12 KOs) in what emerged as the final fight of the Ukrainian southpaw’s career.
Keith Idec is a senior writer and columnist for The Ring. He can be reached on X @idecboxing