By the late stages of 2020, every boxer in the world was feeling desperate. With the COVID-19 pandemic ravaging the globe and by extension, the sport, fighters were doing things out of desperation to stay in shape and to stay active. Fighters trained in their homes or in public parks, and fought in empty venues wherever competition would be allowed, often times for meager paydays with the absence of ticket sales.

Few fighters went to such extreme measures as Lucas Bahdi did however. Frustrated with the lack of opportunities coming his way even before the pandemic, Bahdi took the steps to book himself a fight in Cuernevaca, Mexico, one of the regions that began hosting fights with some regularity during that time period. The only issue was, Bahdi had a broken hand.

"I funded my whole career from my pro debut," Bahdi told The Ring. "I just said you know I'm gonna I'm gonna fund my own career and buy my own fights and eventually get signed to one of the big promoters. That was my goal. So, I fought nine nine fights in nine months. and (then) I was sitting the bench, and I just got fed up, and I said I'm going to Mexico, f--- this. I took the fight, and then I broke my hand in the training camp sparring, and then it was just, I didn't know it was broken; I just thought, 'Oh, you know, I got five weeks there's f---ing plenty of time; I won't use it until the fight or whatever right?' And come fight time, I still couldn't even touch with it, like, it was messed up.”

By the end of the first round of his bout against Alejandro Hernandez, Bahdi had a bigger issue: Another broken hand. Now, he found himself in a seemingly hopeless situation in an immediate and long-term sense simultaneously. An independent contractor, a boxer without a major promotional contract trying to make a living in a world largely shut down, in the midst of a boxing match with both of his hands broken. What he would do moving forward was an issue for later, first he had to make it through this fight.

"So, I'm in there with f---ing two broken hands and against a hungry Mexican that I mean, don't get me wrong, he wasn't he wasn't high opposition, but he had big, big set of nuts, he could punch a bit, and he wanted to win, and I was trying everything you know? I couldn't think properly because I was in so much like pain when I was punching. I had to just bite down on the mouth piece right? It was a lot of pain, but I was like, 'I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna do it,' f---ing nightmare. My, my eyes were almost swollen shut both eyes. I was taking a whooping because I couldn't think in there and I was just taking little shots, I wasn't getting hurt, and then he ripped the f---ing hook into my body, and I was like 'holy f---'! And he kept going for it. It was insane. It was the craziest experience of my life."

It isn’t hyperbole to say that Bahdi’s career could have effectively ended in this moment and few people outside of the Canadian boxing scene would have noticed. The show was not aired anywhere, and Bahdi was alone at the fight with no coach, in part due to pandemic restrictions, in part for fiscal reasons.

"I was 9-0, and I remember like thinking, 'nine and one,' and I'm like no f---ing way.' And I just...I'm a stubborn guy, right? I'm just like, 'Just push through it,'" said Bahdi. "'I just remember thinking 'hit him with the right, it's gonna hurt, and just bite him bite down on the mouthpiece and hit him with the f---ing cannon. I tried to set it up and I f---ing missed by a millimeter, and then it was right after he threw a combination boom, I hit him with a counter left hook, and down he went."

If that sequence sounds familiar, it’s because it’s effectively the same situation, same combination that he hit Ashton Sylve with last year to score the knockout lauded by many as the best of the year. The same combination that saved his career is the one that changed his life forever.

The version of Lucas Bahdi in 2025 couldn’t be in a more different place than he was in back in 2020. After scoring a sensational knockout victory over prized MVP Promotions prospect, there might have been fear that Bahdi would become victim to a “freezing out” plan, that he not only wouldn’t reap the rewards of a Knockout of the Year but would in fact be punished in a sense for doing so. Instead, the opposite happened. After fielding offers from “every major promoter,” he signed a contract with Jake Paul’s MVP outfit, and became one of the jewels of his stable.

Four months later, he was fighting on the undercard of Paul’s bout against Mike Tyson, one of the most watched boxing broadcasts in history. Bahdi had gone from boxing in a park in Cuernevaca in the midst of a plague surrounded by brick walls struggling to maintain their paint job and ten foot high chain link fences to the households of hundreds of millions of people worldwide.

“I knew that the opportunity with MVP was going to be much greater than everyone else and their promotion is, man it's next level,” said Bahdi. “Not only that, but like I’ve mentioned in the past, Jake brings in different audience, so it's the best of both worlds.”

The true full-circle moment is ahead for Bahdi, who will get a chance to headline an MVP Promotions event on March 7 in Toronto, roughly an hour from his hometown of Niagara Falls, marking the promotional outfit’s first venture into Canada. Bahdi will take on Ryan Racaza in a fight he says is intended to put him in position for a lightweight title eliminator bout.

But there’s another stroke of luck involved here. For many years, the Ontario commission mandated same-day weigh-ins, and had a rule which stipulated that boxers could only wrap their hands with ten yards of gauze. These rules were a major deterrent to bringing fights to the province, and moved the WBC to “declare a moratorium” on title fights in the province back in 2016. However, new rules introduced give the Ontario commission leeway to hold a weigh-in for a combat sports event anywhere between 8 and 36 hours before the start of the event. They also allow “soft gauze not over two inches wide and not more than 60 feet in length and adhesive athletic tape not over one inch wide and not more than 30 feet in length.”

Bahdi’s emergence as a budding star, MVP’s venture north, and the progressive movement by the commission could signal a shift in momentum for the province’s boxing scene, which has lagged behind that of Quebec, which has helped produce many major stars over the years—including current RING light heavyweight champion Artur Beterbiev.

"It pushed me away, like I never wanted to fight here because I'm like, man, I gotta protect my hands," says Bahdi, acknowledging the humor and irony considering what happened in Mexico. "It could be the start of a new era for us."