With the WBA "regular" welterweight title being vacated, Golden Boy Promotions made a request to the organization to have one of the company's fighters have a shot at the title.
Golden Boy Promotions' head matchmaker Robert Diaz issued the request to have Lucas Matthysse, the WBA's No.3 ranked welterweight, to fight top-ranked Tewa Kiram.
The organization has been trying for years to reduce the number of WBA world titles per division to just one and it has that in Keith Thurman, the organization's "super" champion at welterweight as well as being the WBC champion. The "regular" title was vacated by Lamont Peterson, who is fighting IBF welterweight champion Errol Spence Jr. in January. Should the request go through and Matthysse vs. Kiram becomes a reality, the winner would then become the mandatory challenger to Thurman's WBA title.
Thurman has been out of action since March due to elbow surgery as a result of his welterweight unification fight against Danny Garcia. Thurman recently told Fightful that his first fight is expected to come in the first quarter of 2018, but it will likely not be against the winner of the WBC Silver welterweight title fight between Shawn Porter and Adrian Granados and Thurman would be fighting lesser competition to shake off the ring rust.
Garcia is ranked No. 2 in the organization's rankings, but he'll likely be fighting former world champion Brandon Rios in his next fight. That fight hasn't been made official, but the two sides have been negotiating for some time now.
