Emmanuel Rodriguez could not be more thrilled to potentially join the boxing revival enjoyed by his beloved island.

The past eight months have seen Amanda Serrano become Puerto Rico’s first ever undisputed champion and Subriel Matias and Oscar Collazo both win major titles for Puerto Rico. Rodriguez is now one win away from adding to the growing roster of active titlists from his homeland when he faces Nicaragua’s Melvin Lopez (29-1, 19KOs) for the vacant IBF bantamweight title this Saturday on Showtime from MGM National Harbor in Oxon Hill, Maryland.

“Becoming and remaining a world champion is hard,” Rodriguez told BoxingScene.com. “Right now, we have four excellent fighters from Puerto Rico who currently hold world titles and they have established themselves as the best or right there with the very best in their weight division.

“Looking at that incredible group of talent, it will be an honor for me to become the fifth current Puerto Rican world champion. Boricuas are riding a wave of success and we have to enjoy the moment.”

Jonathan ‘Bomba’ Gonzalez is Puerto Rico’s other current reigning titlist, as the southpaw holds the WBO junior flyweight belt.

This weekend’s title fight comes nearly ten months after Rodriguez (21-2, 13KOs; 1NC)  punched his way back into contention with a technical decision win over previously unbeaten Gary Antonio Russell. Their title eliminator last October 15 in Brooklyn, New York saw Rodriguez win nearly every round to become the mandatory challenger to the IBF 118-pound title he previously held.  

Rodriguez beat England’s Paul Butler in May 2018 for the vacant title and retained the title more than a year until his knockout loss to Naoya Inoue (25-0, 22KOs). In between came a successful defense versus then-unbeaten Jason Moloney.

Inoue went on to fully unify all the bantamweight belts and has since dethroned Stephen Fulton for the WBC/WBO junior featherweight title to become a four-division titlist. Butler went on to win the WBO title which he lost to Inoue last December, while Moloney is the current WBO bantamweight titlist.

That stellar level of competition combined with his own talent leaves Rodriguez—a 31-year-old from Manati, Puerto Rico—confident that he can keep the momentum going after watching Matias and Collazo both post knockout wins to claim titles at junior welterweight and strawweight, respectively.

“Subriel Matias is here training with me and we talk every day,” noted Rodriguez.Collazo and I are close too. He told me that I was one of the first five people who congratulated him when he won the title earlier this year. We all root for each other. Matias always tells me to believe in myself and is a real motivator for me. 

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