Naoya Inoue vs Alan Picasso: Undisputed Junior Featherweight Title

Naoya Inoue is a pound-for-pound great, as he finishes the year against a crafty, lanky undefeated fighter from Mexico, Alan Picasso, who sports a record of 32-0-1. In the fight in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, he is the overwhelming favorite to win, with odds of -5000, indicating a 94% probability of victory. Being the underdog doesn’t mean, however, that Picasso is a pushover. Both are undefeated and have contrasting styles. 


Alan Picasso, sometimes known as David Picasso or Alan Picasso Romero, is a jab-first orthodox boxer with respectable power. He likes to pressure his opponents through volume and movement. He needs to be in a rhythm to be effective. When he becomes sloppy, that is when he gets in trouble. Though not as strong as Inoue, who sports one-punch power, he, on the other hand, could stop opponents just through his relentlessness and accumulation of punches. Standing at 5 foot 8 inches, he is 3 inches taller than Inoue, who stands at 5 foot 5 inches. 


Though Inoue is in no doubt the best in the lower weight divisions, he is not perfect. At the beginning of fights, he gets overexcited and leaves himself vulnerable against volume punchers. He stays close enough that it gives his opponents opportunities they would not have had otherwise. His last opponent, Murodjon Akhmadaliev, was his toughest opponent for a while, and he defeated him rather easily on September 14, 2025, in Japan.


Picasso is a volume puncher who relies on his opponents' willingness to trade punches with him, setting them up with jabs to get openings; however, Inoue is a chameleon in the ring. He adjusts to any style a boxer implies or changes. In other words, he is a master at setting up traps. Alan is vulnerable to Inoue’s body punches, as he keeps his arms too high at times, forgetting to defend his body. While his body takes enough punishment, he could be more vulnerable to head punches.


Anything can happen in any fight, but the likelihood of it happening depends on a certain situation at a particular moment. Naoya Inoue has proven himself time and time again to be the best, so it is very difficult to lean on his opponent to beat him. Naoya Inoue wins by unanimous decision on December 27th in Riyadh.

<-----Read Lamont Roach vs Pitbull Cruz prediction