What makes a champion? Sebastian Fundora and Brandon Figueroa offer completely different solutions

Boxing followers not often agree on anything, not to mention who’s the champion of the sport’s many divisions. 

At heavyweight, for occasion, 4 completely different fighters lay claim to 4 completely different items of the same crown. Murat Gassiev is the WBA champion, Agit Kabayel has the WBC belt, Daniel Dubois is the WBO ruler, and Filip Hrgović reigns with the IBF. 

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But very few people would take into account Oleksandr Usyk as anything other than the division’s king, contemplating he was, until just lately, the undisputed champion, has never been overwhelmed and has twice defeated Tyson Fury, Anthony Joshua and Dubois. 

On a Premier Boxing Champions card in Las Vegas this weekend, two fighters who know what it takes to win a belt talked to Uncrowned about whether there actually is a distinction between being one of the sport’s many titleholders or a bona fide champion. 

“I guess there’s a difference for some people,” WBC tremendous welterweight world champion Sebastian Fundora informed Uncrowned. “If you hold one of the four belts, you are a champion. If I have the title, I am the champion.” 

Fundora won his first world titles in 2024, battling through 12 rounds of blood, punishment and chaos against Tim Tszyu, who seemed like he had a gaping axe wound on his brow. Fundora has made three profitable defenses since, including a seventh-round stoppage of Tszyu in their 2025 rematch and a sixth-round technical knockout over Keith Thurman earlier this yr. 

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There is no Usyk in the 154-pound weight class. No lineal champion, per se. No man who beat the man. The undisputed throne is vacant and tremendous welterweight is as fragmented as heavyweight, with Fundora one of three champions, alongside unified WBA and WBO champion Jaron “Boots” Ennis and IBF champion Josh Kelly.

Before Fundora can entertain future world title unification fights, he’ll first put his WBC title on the line against Ermal Hadribeaj on Saturday during a Premier Boxing Champions occasion on DAZN and TNT. 

He’s not the only fighter with championship pedigree on the card, as Brandon Figueroa fights Tomoki Kameda in his first protection of the WBA featherweight championship he won by knocking out Nick Ball in the twelfth spherical on Feb. 7. 

Fundora’s definition of being a champion is literal. You win a title, you become a champion. But Figueroa expands this to embody a more romantic notion. Being a champion is a code to stay by.

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“It means you’re not only a champion in the ring but out of it, too,” Figueroa informed Uncrowned. “I gotta be a great example, a great role model. Gotta be able to motivate. Inspire the youth. It’s like I always say, you can have your head in the clouds but keep your feet on the ground.” 

A veteran of 30 bouts, Figueroa won his first title at age 22 when he retired Yonfrez Parejo in 2019 to claim the interim WBA tremendous bantamweight belt. He has completed Luis Nery, lost twice to Stephen Fulton, but rebounded at 126 kilos to become a two-division champion. 

It is a standing that, for Figueroa, carries a necessary requirement to honor tasks related with public recognition. Take satisfaction in yourself. Treat others effectively. “Have the heart of a champion in every walk of your life,” he said.

Fundora, too, acknowledges qualities that elevate fighters beyond their championship belts. But he has another distinction in thoughts: the distinction between a champion and a famous person.

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Oscar De La Hoya, a Hall of Fame fighter turned promoter, is one. “He really made no bad moves, and even when he lost, he still lost with grace. He was always the people’s champ,” Fundora said of his fellow Californian. 

And yet, despite the particular person glory boxing guarantees, and however lonely the sport becomes when the bell rings in Round 1, neither man believes champions are made alone.

“It takes champions to make a champion,” Fundora said, a nod to his father and coach, Freddy Fundora. 

Figueroa meanwhile recalled a praise he just lately acquired. “‘Manny Robles always has the most humble champions,'” Figueroa said he was informed. “It’s a representation of my coach, how he moves, and how he carries himself.”

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One of the championship traits Fundora and Figueroa share heading into their separate title fights this weekend is starvation. 

Fundora regards Hadribeaj as one of his “easier fights” but is trying forward at a winner-take-all conflict with “Boots,” offering Ennis gets previous Kelly, if and when they guide their unification bout. 

As for Figueroa, he needs “to be known as one of the best fighters on the planet. … I feel like I still have a lot of years in the sport,” he said, “and I’ve barely gotten started.”

Whatever being a champion means to either, neither considers the job full.