Naoya Inoue believes his busy schedule this year has been crucial to building momentum going into a potential mega-fight with Junto Nakatani in 2026.
The undisputed world junior featherweight champion, and one of the world’s best pound-for-pound boxers, is widely expected to retain his titles against Mexican challenger Alan Picasso at Mohammed Abdo Arena in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on Dec. 27. Inoue’s Japanese rival Nakatani faces Sebastian Hernandez as the co-main event of the card.
Afterwards, if ‘The Monster’ Inoue (31-0, 27 KOs) and Nakatani (31-0, 24 KOs) remain champions, they will have a polite face-to-face encounter as their fight at the Tokyo Dome in 2026 is officially announced.
Too many fights? Naoya Inoue rejects problem
Inoue, 32, makes a seventh junior featherweight title defence vs. Picasso, in what will be his fourth fight this year. No other men’s world champion boxer can match Inoue’s activity this year and some question whether it has been too much.
Following a Round 4 KO of Ki Ye-Joon in January, Inoue even admitted he was “mentally exhausted”. In May, Inoue was dropped by Ramon Cardenas in Round 2, but he quickly recovered to stop Cardenas in Round 8. Inoue’s third fight of the year was a masterful performance as he sustained a relentless pace to unanimously outpoint Murodjon Akhmadaliev in September.
For Inoue, this year’s busy schedule has been perfect.
“Firstly I like fighting, and second, I want to keep building my career step by step so this is why I chose to fight four times this year,” he told ESPN.
“It’s very important for me and very good for me to have four fights in the year ahead of a fight with Nakatani.”
Inoue, a world champion in four weight divisions, was recently ranked No. 2 behind super middleweight champion Terence Crawford in ESPN’s 2025 boxing top 100.
Victory over Nakatani, his Japanese rival who trains out of Los Angeles, could earn him top spot in the pound-for-pound rankings in a clash that is being hailed the biggest fight in Japanese boxing history.
Nakatani, 27, who is three inches taller at 5-foot-8, has also been busy this year after registering stoppage wins vs. Ryosuke Nishida and David Cuellar Contreras.
“This [fight vs. Nakatani] will be a big fight in Japan and it will be historic, a big battle and a lot of people will be interested to see it not just in Japan,” Inoue told ESPN.
Inoue has held world title belts at junior flyweight, junior bantamweight, bantamweight and junior featherweight. Despite suffering knockdowns in two of his last five fights (vs. Cardenas and Luis Nery in May 2024), Inoue reckons junior featherweight is his optimum weight class.
“I feel I’m the best at junior featherweight, better than other weight classes,” Inoue told ESPN.
Picasso (32-0-1, 17 KOs) impressively won a majority decision over Kyonosuke Kameda in a 10-round fight in July.
“I didn’t look at his last fight, I’m just going to focus on winning,” Inoue told ESPN.
Inoue, who confirmed to ESPN he will move up to featherweight at some point, believes Japanese boxing can get even better than the boom it is currently enjoying. Seven world champion boxers are from Japan in the men’s and women’s game, as well as the likes of Nakatani who relinquished his world bantamweight titles in September.
“There are a lot of up and coming boxers from Japan, many promising talented fighters so I believe Japanese boxing will get better and better,” Inoue told ESPN.
