Brandon Figueroa Misses Weight, Loses WBA Featherweight Belt on the Scale

Brandon Figueroa won't be a champion when he walks to the ring Saturday night. The WBA featherweight titleholder, 27-2-1 with 20 knockouts, tipped the scale over a pound heavy for his defense against Tomoki Kameda and was promptly stripped of the belt. The fight goes on; the title doesn't go on with him.

Figueroa told Chris Mannix he picked up a hamstring injury in camp, which — if accurate — scrambles the usual last-minute cutting tricks that rely on sweating off the final pound. That's a steep price for a fighter who just scored the best win of his career, a 12th-round TKO of Nick Ball, to climb to WBA champion in the first place.

The Roadmap Just Burned Down

Here's the real sting. Figueroa reportedly turned down a unification with Rafael Espinoza earlier this year, choosing instead to sit and wait on Naoya Inoue — who has since confirmed he's moving up to 126 rather than hang around for "Bam" Rodriguez. That patience only pays off if you're holding a belt when Inoue arrives. Figueroa no longer is.

Kameda, 42-5 with 23 KOs, can simply take it. Win Saturday and the vacant strap is his, and he'd likely inherit the Inoue sweepstakes too — a matchup that would print money on Japanese soil. Not bad for a man fighting for the first time in 17 months, since a close decision loss to Angelo Leo, who's since become IBF champion at 26-1.

Stylistically, both men prefer to plant their feet and trade to the body, so the extra pound may not swing much once the leather flies. But the consequences outside the ropes are enormous for Figueroa, who now has to win a fight that can no longer make him champion.

If Kameda falls short, the queue gets interesting. No. 1 contender Mirco Cuello has waited nearly two years since winning a final eliminator, watching Ball and then Figueroa cut in front of him. Behind him sit KO merchant Mikito Nakano and Ivan Chirkov — the latter somehow ranked off a six-round draw with an Uzbek opponent whose previous 11 foes went a combined 0-12. The division's a mess. Saturday's scale just made it messier.