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Mike Coppinger, ESPN Boxing Insider
Jared Anderson, the nation's top heavyweight championship contender, will face his toughest test yet when he takes on Martin Bacall on Aug. 3 in Los Angeles, it was announced Wednesday.
Anderson (17-0, 16 KOs) was scheduled to face former champion Deontay Wilder at the Riyadh season headlined by Terence Crawford vs. Israel Madrimov, but Wilder was eliminated from the running after suffering a fifth-round TKO loss to Jieri Zhang on Saturday.
Anderson will face his first top-level opponent against the 30-year-old Democratic Republic of Congo native, Bakole (21-1, 15 KOs), ranked No. 10 by ESPN in the heavyweight division and the younger brother of former cruiserweight champion Ilunga Makabu.
The 24-year-old Houston-based Anderson is ranked No. 8 by ESPN as a heavyweight.
At 6-foot-4 and 250.9 pounds, Anderson was taller than Riyad Merhi, the diminutive heavyweight (5-foot-9, 135.6 pounds) whom Anderson beat on points in 10 rounds in April. But that wouldn't be the case against the 6-foot-6 Bakole, who knocked out Carlos Takam in fourth round in December in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Bakole weighed 299.5 pounds.
Bakole suffered his first loss by majority decision to Olympic gold medalist Toni Yoka in May 2022. Bakole's only loss was a 10th-round TKO to Michael Hunter in October 2018. Hunter's only loss came in April 2017 when he lost by decision to unbeaten heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk in a cruiserweight title fight.
Anderson's win over Merry was his first in the ring since a series of run-ins with police. Anderson was arrested in Michigan in February after leading a car chase that lasted more than six miles at speeds in excess of 130 mph.
In December, Anderson pleaded not guilty to improper handling of a firearm in a motor vehicle, and a DUI charge related to a November 2023 arrest in Ohio was dropped.
The Riyadh Season card, which takes place in Los Angeles on August 3, will be the first that Saudi Arabia's General Entertainment Authority chairman Turki Al-Alshik has organized outside the Kingdom.
In the main event, Crawford will face Madrimov in an attempt to become a four-division junior middleweight champion. Isaac Cruz will defend his WBA junior welterweight title against Jose Valenzuela on the undercard, while former heavyweight champion Andy Ruiz will face Jarrell Miller. Vergil Ortiz will face a replacement opponent for Tim Tschu, who was forced to withdraw last week due to a still-healing scalp cut.
