On the journey to what has felt like Jaron “Boots” Ennis’ inevitable march to the top half of boxing’s pound-for-pound rankings, the slick and explosive switch-hitter from Philadelphia has seemingly mastered the fine (and frustrating) art of hurry up and wait. The 28-year-old Ennis (35-0, 31 KOs), who turned pro in 2016 and was declared nothing short of the next big thing in the sport as early as 2018, has been forced to take the long road to earning the chance to prove just how great he is after being shamelessly avoided by big names at 147 pounds for what felt like an eternity. Despite an extremely difficult weight cut that Ennis now admits muted his dynamic skillset, he endured at 147 pounds long enough to finally unify titles in April 2025, when he obliterated unbeaten champion Eimantas Stanionis via sixth-round TKO. That victory was supposed to precede a move up to 154 pounds and a superfight against fellow unbeaten Vergil Ortiz Jr. (24-0, 22 KOs), which would offer career-defining opportunities for both.
True to Ennis’ story, however, the fight never happened — despite an in-ring faceoff between them following Ennis’ 154-pound debut last October — as a last-minute standoff between Ortiz’s manager (Rick Mirigian) and promoter (Oscar De La Hoya) led to a bitter legal battle.
Enter Xander Zayas (23-0, 13 KOs), the 23-year-old Puerto Rican rising star who captured the vacant WBO junior middleweight title last July before unifying belts with WBA titleholder Abass Baraou via split decision in January.
Zayas, who missed out on a shot at the 2020 Olympics when the age limit was raised to 19, agreed to test himself by defending his titles against Ennis, which is something none of the other beltholders at 154 pounds were willing to do.
On Saturday, one day after Ennis turns 29, the pair of flashy 20-somethings with a combined perfect record will square off inside the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York, to decide who is the true power broker at junior middleweight (8 p.m., DAZN PPV and TNT Sports simulcast).
Considering Ennis didn’t receive a chance to become the unified king at welterweight until all of the elite former champions like Terence Crawford and Errol Spence Jr. had moved on, the Zayas fight — finally — provides Ennis an opportunity to declare himself the best-in-class atop one of the sport’s most competitive divisions with a win while further strengthening his P4P claim.
“This is my birthday gift to myself,” Ennis told “The Ariel Helwani Show” on Tuesday. “This is already set in stone. I already won. I’m ready to show out and show that I’m the best in the world.
“Once I figured out that we weren’t going to be able to make the Ortiz fight, I told [promoter] Eddie [Hearn of Matchroom Sport] and my team, ‘Please go make the Xander fight. He is the next best option. He has two belts. He has what I want.'”
Ennis’ lone appearance at junior middleweight might’ve come against an inferior opponent in Uisma Lima when Ennis headlined a card at Wells Fargo Arena in his home city for the third time in four fights, but the first-round demolition following a pair of knockdowns provided a little tease at just how much more dangerous Ennis could be at his new weight class.
“I’m not playing with these guys,” Ennis reported. “I’m at a new weight class and I feel tremendous. They are going to see [it] firsthand. I hear the stuff they are saying but I don’t play it no mind. I’m going to make every last one of them eat the words that they are saying.”
Some of those words have come from Zayas, who kicked off fight week by telling Helwani that Ennis is an incomplete fighter, calling him “flat-footed.” Zayas also went on to say that when Ennis was 23, he was “padding his record” against fighters who were “trying to pay their child support.”
“[Zayas] just be talking, he just be talking,” Ennis reported. “People don’t realize that everybody’s path is different. I turned pro in 2016 and some people have a faster route. My route was a little slower and I feel like it was because I’m going to be on top forever. I’m here right now and I’m taking over this division.”
Ennis now admits he should’ve left the welterweight division two fights ago but only hung around because his dream has always been to be an undisputed four-belt champion. It wasn’t until he became convinced that the other elite welterweights “were playing around and didn’t want to fight” that he put his health first.
Ennis has certainly faced tougher competition overall up to this point than Zayas, despite the fact that his opponent holds two of four recognized world titles at 154 pounds. The major difference between the two fighters, according to Ennis, is that Zayas employs a more traditional boxing style that “Boots” is very familiar with.
But on the flip side, finding the proper sparring partners to mimic the sublime athleticism and creative offensive attack of Ennis is anything but easy.
“I’ve been around the block and I’ve seen everything,” Ennis reported. “The difference between me and him is there are so many other fighters that fight like him in this boxing game, whether it’s in a pro fight, amateur fight or sparring. I’ve seen him many times. He has never seen anybody like me. I’m different. I could do everything. I could box and bang in a pressure fight. I can be slick when I want to. I can do whatever I want in this ring.
“I’m about to show him that there really are levels to this game.”
Ennis has touted for years that he simply performs better against the highest level of competition and is sometimes unable to showcase the higher end of his ceiling when opponents are incapable of pulling it out of him.
The biggest part of Ennis’ game that is difficult to adjust to is how often and when he effortlessly switches between southpaw and orthodox stances. A natural right-hander, Ennis’ ability to float and adjust has been compared to none other than Crawford and the normally humble and reserved “Boots” believes he’s already the best switch-hitter that boxing has ever seen.
“I’m going to say me. I feel like I’m equally even on both sides of everything with skills, power, defense, my jab,” Ennis reported. “I think some of these guys that switch sides are not equally as good on the other side.”
So much of Ennis’ career up to this point has been graded on a curve due to just how much we still don’t know about him. On Saturday, he will finally get his chance to solidify all of the foreshadowing regarding where he stands among the best at his weight class, if not the sport at large.
