Julio Cesar Martinez

Julio Cesar Martinez Aguilar (born 27 January 1995) is a Mexican professional boxer who has held the World Boxing Council (WBC) flyweight title since 2019.

As of November 2022, Martinez is ranked as the best active flyweight boxer in the world by ESPN, second by The Ring and TBRB, and tenth by BoxRec.

Martinez made his professional debut against Joaquin Cruz on October 16, 2015.

He lost the fight by a split decision.

He would go on to amass a 13-1 record over the course of his next 13 fights.

Martinez was scheduled to fight Andrew Selby on March 23, 2019, in a WBC Flyweight title eliminator to determine the next mandatory challenger.

Martinez won the fight by a fifth-round knockout, handing Selby the first loss of his professional career.

Selby had a great start to the fight, before a clash of heads in the third round cut him along his left eyebrow, for which Martinez was deducted a point.

Martinez enjoyed more success from the third round onward, knocking Selby down with a liver shot 57 seconds into the fifth round.

As Martinez had secured his position as the mandatory WBC flyweight title challenger with the fifth-round knockout of Andrew Selby, WBC ordered the reigning flyweight world champion Charlie Edwards to defend his title against Martinez.

They were later given a weeklong extension from the sanctioning body to come to terms as regards the purse and venue.

The two parties avoided going to a purse bid, agreeing to fight at The O2 Arena in London, on the Lomachenko vs Campbell undercard, on August 31, 2019.

In the third round of the fight, Martinez landed a combination of punches which staggered the champion, forcing him to take a knee.

As he did so, Martinez landed a heavy body shot that completely took Edwards out of the fight.

Referee Mark Lyson stopped the bout, while WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman reviewed the fight ending sequence.

Sulaiman found the fight ending shot to have landed egregiously late, officially overturning the fight to a no-contest.

During the post-fight interview, Edwards stated: "This is the right decision. I took a knee for a purpose...We get in this ring to abide by the rules".

WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman said he had ordered a rematch, to which Edwards acquiesced.

Edwards' manager Eddie Hearn was elusive as to the rematch, however, claiming that they planned to move up to super flyweight.

Edwards officially vacated his WBC Flyweight title on October 6, 2019.

Following former WBC flyweight champion Charlie Edwards’ decision to vacate the title and move to super flyweight, WBC scheduled the #1 ranked Martinez to fight the #2 ranked Cristofer Rosales for the vacant WBC Flyweight championship.

Martinez was scheduled to fight the former WBC flyweight titlist on December 20, 2019, on the undercard of the Super-Middleweight fight between Daniel Jacobs and Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. In November 2019, it was revealed that Martinez had tested positive Clenbuterol, a banned substance.

WBC decided not to punish him, as the amount of the muscle-forming drug found in his system wasn't deemed sufficient to register any in-competition benefit.

Martinez won the fight with Rosales by a ninth-round technical knockout.

Martinez took over the fight in the third round, after two competitive back-and-forth rounds, battering the exhausted former champion until referee Raul Caiz stopped the fight.

Martinez was scheduled to make his first title defense against Jay Harris, on February 29, 2020.

It was scheduled for the undercard of the Mikey Garcia-Jessie Vargas welterweight fight.

Martinez was the favorite heading into the bout, with Harris being a 7/1 underdog.

Martinez pressured throughout the first half of the fight, with his pace slowing from the eight round onward.

Harris suffered a cut above his left eye in the second round, and was knocked down in the tenth round.

Martinez won the fight by unanimous decision, with varied scorecards of 118-109, 116-111, and 115-112.

Martinez was scheduled to make his second title defense against Maximino Flores on October 23, 2020.

Four days before the fight, Flores announced his withdrawal from the bout due to a positive COVID-19 test.

Accordingly, Martinez was rescheduled to defend his title against Moisés Calleros.

Calleros accepted the fight on less than one week’s notice.

Due to the short notice, he was unable to cut weight properly, and weighed in at 117.4 pounds, 5.4 pounds over the title limit.

Martinez won the fight by a second-round technical knockdown.

He staggered Calleros with a left hook-right straight combination, before unloading with numerous power punches, which forced the referee Cesar Castanon to stop the fight at the 2:42 minute mark.

During the post fight interview, Martinez stated his desire to fight fellow titleholder Artem Dalakian and Moruti Mthalane in a title unification bouts, before moving up to super flyweight.

Martinez was scheduled to defend his title for the third time against the former unified minimumweight world champion Francisco Rodríguez Jr. on December 19, 2020, on the Canelo Álvarez and Callum Smith undercard.