11. Junto Nakatani (32-1, 24 KOs)
Junto Nakatani was born in Inabe, Mie Prefecture, Japan on January 2nd, 1998. He began boxing at the age of seven and turned professional in 2015 at 17 years old. His early professional career was marked by rapid success, capturing the Japanese flyweight title in 2019 before vacating it to pursue world championship opportunities.
On November 6th 2020, Nakatani captured his first world title with an 8th round knockout win over Giemel Magramo to become the WBO flyweight champion. He successfully defended the title against Ángel Acosta in September 2021 and Ryota Yamauchi in April 2022.
After his victory over Yamauchi, Nakatani moved up to the super flyweight division months later and defeated Francisco Rodriguez in Japan. He became a two division champion by defeating Andrew Moloney by knockout on May 20th 2023. Nakatani made one defense of that title in September of that year, getting a decision win over Argi Cortes.
In 2024, he won the WBC bantamweight title in February 2024 with a sixth-round TKO over Alexandro Santiago. He has since defended the title successfully against Vincent Astrolabio, Petch Sor Chitpattana, and David Cuellar. On June 8th he will face Ryosuke Nishida for the WBC and IBF bantamweight titles.
Nakatani has expressed interest in moving up to super bantamweight to challenge Naoya Inoue, the current undisputed champion in that division. Promoter Bob Arum has indicated plans for this potential matchup, which would be one of the most significant bouts in Japanese boxing history. Nakatani unified the WBC and IBF titles at bantamweight with a sixth round stoppage of Ryosuke Nishida and aspires to be the undisputed champion before taking on Inoue.
