Jaron “Boots” Ennis (25-0, 23 KOs), is a fighter, whomever hardcore boxing fan knows, surely all the fighters who grew up in USA Boxing know of him, but as of now, very surely isn’t a household name, and occasional boxing fan or the fan of a certain network fan might not know him.

The Philadelphia, PA welterweight who has been in a boxing gym for as long as he has been alive training at his father, Derek “Bozy” Ennis’ gym or his Instagram account refers to it, a dungeon. Ennis also has two older brothers, Derek “Pooh” Ennis and Farah Ennis, both of whom professionals as well.

For the Ennis family, boxing is a family affair.

Ennis as I read articles about is often described with generic praise “fan-friendly” and “exciting”, both of which are good things to be said about you, but rarely do people explain why the twenty-some-odd fight fighter, is capturing people’s attention besides highlight-reel knockouts.

For me, Ennis reminds me of the movie, “The Matrix”. Ennis is able to be defensive sharp, even when keeping his left hand a little lower than say Joe Louis would’ve, as well as leaping in with dynamic punches, namely a left-hook, an iconic punch most young fighters copied or learned from Roy Jones Jr, one of the sports most exciting fighters ever. Ennis is able to land explosive bursts along with unique and uncommon combos that have me taking notice.

Ennis is exciting as well because he turns defense into offense. In the modern era, we often have big punchers or guys who don’t get hit, but rarely do you have guys who have strong attributes in both. Ennis just seems special, even though nerds on the internet could complain he hasn’t “fought anybody”, but plenty of fighters get to 25 fights without a 92% knockout ratio in the welterweight division, at the very least he has power, and at the ceiling, he is a transcendent talent.

That being said, Ennis is moving on up, as he will fight on Showtime Championship Boxing for the first time, previously fighting on ShoBox: The Next Generation, a developmental circuit of the same networks boxing programming. In short, this is Ennis’ first chance to be seen by more eyeballs as the main event features Erickson Lubin, the man who somewhat started the trend of turning pro early, against 2012 Olympian Terrell Gausha, a solid crossroads fight for both fighters.

Ennis is the opener and has a chance to be the most exciting bout of the night as well.

That being said, Ennis will face Juan Carlos Abreu, a fighter promoted by Paco Damian, a longtime Northern California promoter, who has brought along solid talent along with mentor and boxing hall-of-famer Don Chargin, who now sadly is no longer with us.

In the lead up this bout, a press release sent out about Abreu offered some hints that Ennis will have some new things to deal with, first let me give you the quote then I will explain.

“I thank God, my family, and my team – Reyes Boxing and Hector Bermudez – for this opportunity to show my skills against a great fighter,” Abreu said via a press release sent out this week.

Abreu is a solid top-20-to-25-ish guy, who stopped Jesus Soto Karass and lost a hotly debated decision Egidijus Kavaliauskas, affectionately known as “The Mean Machine”.

Abreu also mentioned Hector Bermudez, the coach of Abraham Nova, Mark DeLuca, amongst others, as he has a team around him that has gotten to world-level fights.

The only fighter comparable to Abreu that Ennis has faced, in my opinion, is his last opponent from January, Bakhtiyar Eyubov, a man who San Francisco-local Karim Mayfield, in my opinion, beat, but was not awarded the decision. Ennis is taking the Mike Tyson approach to matchmaking in which it appears each opponent is slightly better than the next.

So what can you expect on Saturday?

Well, Abreu will look to go rounds as he is a spoiler, and this should show us, a bit of how special ‘Boots’ Ennis as Abreu has never been stopped, even when Alexander Besputin was landing shots that would have had most of us mortal men say “no more!”

Abreu is not soft, he will fight, he will box, he will look to win and worst case he will look to survive.

This is a gutsy fight for Ennis, and I will tell you why. Abreu is a guy who can make you look bad, and on a national primetime card debut, in which most fight fans are assuming to see Ennis do what he has been doing, any type of struggles will be magnified, as the internet and Philly are hyping Ennis, but most fans outside of that are not. Let’s take it a step further, people love being right, but a lot of people also love proving people wrong, so the result with be amplified based on the performance.

In short, this will be a lot of people’s first impression upon meeting ‘Boots’ Ennis, and he is taking on a guy with a big amateur background, who knows how to not get hit clean.

If Ennis stops Abreu to me, this solidifies he is something special. That being said, DON’T RUSH HIM! Let Ennis become the special fighter building up to the big fights, as my fear, will be the overeagerness to want to put him in fights with the biggest names since those fights merit the biggest purses. I just have a gut-feeling Ennis is special, I didn’t see it at first, but I say when I am wrong, and am fine with that, and with special fighters, taking time to get prepared for the next level never hurts, as they’re the future of the sport growing.

Jaron Ennis will face Juan Carlos Abreu this Saturday, September 19th, as the first bout of a triple-header starting at 6 PM PST on Showtime.