Henry Cejudo won an Olympic gold medal in wrestling and held UFC titles in two weight classes. On Saturday night in Miami he makes his professional boxing debut against Javon Walton, a 20-year-old best known for playing Ashtray on HBO’s Euphoria.
That sentence is modern combat sports in one line.
Walton Is Not a Celebrity Tomato Can
This is the detail that makes the fight more interesting than it sounds. Walton is 3-0-1 as a professional boxer with one knockout, and his most recent win came against Anthony Mora in September 2025. He has more actual boxing experience than Cejudo does.
Walton also took this fight on short notice after Cejudo’s original opponent, the influencer known as Deen the Great, withdrew with an injury. A 20-year-old stepping in against a 39-year-old two-division UFC champion on short notice is either brave or well-advised, and his record suggests he can handle himself.
Cejudo’s Athletic Resume Does Not Transfer
Here is the hard truth for anyone expecting Cejudo to walk through this. Olympic wrestling and mixed martial arts do not prepare you to box. The footwork is different, the defensive responsibilities are different, and the absence of a takedown threat removes the thing that made Cejudo’s striking effective in the first place.
In MMA, Cejudo’s opponents had to respect his wrestling, which froze them and opened up his hands. In a boxing ring nobody has to respect anything except his punches, and he has never thrown them for a living.
He is also 39 years old and making his debut in a sport where debuts usually happen at 19.
The Card Is Full of This
The Misfits Boxing event at the James L. Knight Center starts at 6 p.m. ET on DAZN, and the rest of the lineup follows the same logic. Tony Ferguson defends the Misfits middleweight title against a late replacement. There is a middleweight bout featuring a YouTuber fighting a comedian’s dad. A Misfits lightweight title is on the line between Fox The G and Justin Ibarrola.
Dawson Myles Barrett faces Louis Russell at light heavyweight, and Big Bobby The Boss meets Edris Enofe at heavyweight.
Why People Will Watch
Criticize the format all you want, and plenty of boxing purists will. But Cejudo is a legitimately great combat athlete who has never boxed, facing a younger opponent who has. That is a real question with a real answer coming on Saturday night.
The Misfits model works because it puts recognizable names in matchups with genuine uncertainty. Nobody knows what happens when an Olympic wrestler with two UFC belts throws hands for ten minutes without the option to grab a leg.
The Pick
Walton has the boxing experience, the youth and the fewer miles. Cejudo has the championship instincts and a lifetime of competing against elite athletes under pressure.
Take the 20-year-old who actually boxes for a living. Experience in the specific sport beats greatness in a different one, and Cejudo is starting this journey two decades late.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.