Photo: Top Rank Inc.

This week Top Rank Inc. signed three professional fighters to contracts, one of which being three-time Indian Oympian super middleweight Vijender Singh, who won a bronze medal at the 2008 Olympics as well as WBA middleweight champion Rob Brant and South African transplant Chris van Heerden, who relocated to Southern California.

Singh adds variety to a division, Top Rank is heavily invested in, the super middleweight, case and point, look at the main event of December 14th in Texas, in which Top Rank is promoting a bout between WBO super middleweight champion Gilberto “Zurdo” Ramirez rematching Jesse “Hardwork” Hart in 12-round title fight.

Singh is currently 10-0 with 7KOs is targeted to debut in the first quarter of 2019. Singh is 33-years-old with a ton of amateur experience and could be fast-tracked into the title conversation quickly depending on how he performs. Singh has defeated Badou Jack and Sergiy Derevyanchenko in the amateurs as well.

The signing also singals Top Rank furthering their investment outside of the country as they look to promote shows in India, an untapped market in the fight game.

WBA middleweight world champion Rob Brant is now in a co-promotional agreement with Greg Cohen Promotions and Rapacz Boxing.

Brant beat Ryota Murata on October 20th in Las Vegas, Nevada with a high-punch output of 1,262 punches, which makes him a formidable foe for any at the middleweight division.
Brant will be looking to unify the middleweight division especially since the past era guards of “Canelo” Alvarez and Gennady Golovkin look to be out of the division for the near future.
Brant currently trains with Eddie Mustafa Muhammad in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Welterweight Chris van Heerden is a popular South African fighter best known for his loss to Errol Spence Jr. van Heerden trains at Wild Card West in Santa Monica, Ca, and is trained by Julian Chua, a former professional fighter.

The signing signals a need for welterweights to fight Terence Crawford as Egidijus Kavaliauskas aka “The Mean Machine” along with Carlos Adames are the only names that come to this writers mind in terms of potential fights for the superstar fighter. Chris Van Heerden has trained with some of the best in the world and was the favorite for the WBC tournament Real Deal Boxing Promotions put on, before the promotional company stopped promoting shows.