Figueroa's Weekend Collapses at The Cosmopolitan: Stripped on the Scales Friday, Ill Overnight, and the Kameda Fight Is Off

October 17, 2026

LAS VEGAS

A championship reign can end in a ring, in a negotiation, or — as Brandon Figueroa demonstrated across 24 miserable hours in Las Vegas — on a scale and in a sickbed. Figueroa arrived at The Cosmopolitan this weekend as the WBA featherweight champion, making the first defense of the title he took from Nick Ball in Liverpool in February. He will leave it as neither champion nor participant. Friday's weigh-in stripped him of the belt. Friday night's illness, arriving after the weight cut that had already cost him the title, canceled his fight with Tomoki Kameda outright, per Dan Rafael's reporting Saturday and Fightmag's live coverage of tonight's Premier Boxing Champions card at The Chelsea.

Friday: the scale

The unraveling started at the official weigh-in. Figueroa, 29, of Weslaco, Texas, stepped on the scale at 127.4 pounds — 1.4 pounds over the 126-pound featherweight limit, organisers said Friday, per Reuters. Given the customary window to try again, he reportedly came back at 126.8 pounds after the allotted time had passed and did not officially weigh in a second time, per Athlon. Either way, the championship was gone before a punch was thrown: Figueroa was stripped of the WBA title, and a reign that began with a career-defining night in February — a 12th-round knockout of Nick Ball, dropping the champion twice in the final round, per Athlon — ended with zero successful defenses.

The rules had left Kameda a path. Because the challenger made weight, the bout was set to proceed Saturday with the vacant title available to Kameda alone: win, and the 35-year-old Japanese veteran would leave Las Vegas a two-division champion; lose, and the belt would simply stay vacant, per Reuters. Kameda, who has not fought in 18 months, said through a translator on Friday: "Honestly, it's disrespectful, because I'm here, I suffered too. I did my thing. I'm ready for tomorrow," Kameda said. "It has been 18 months since I fought, but look at me, look how shredded I am," Kameda continued. "You know I'm ready. Everything remains the same, I'm going for the title tomorrow," Kameda said.

Overnight: the illness

There will be no tomorrow for the matchup. Figueroa became ill Friday night following the weight cut, and the fight was canceled, Rafael reported Saturday — "Per source, tonight's Figueroa vs. Kameda fight has been canceled after Figueroa became ill Friday night after his weight cut that caused him to miss weight and be stripped of the WBA featherweight title." Fightmag's live-results page for the card confirms the bout is off and attributes it the same way: Figueroa, who missed weight, fell ill overnight. BoxingNews24 noted that Figueroa had also disclosed a hamstring injury to Chris Mannix during the buildup, while cautioning that no confirmed diagnosis explains the illness and the injury should not automatically be treated as its cause. What is confirmed is the sequence: a failed cut, a lost title, an overnight illness, and a canceled co-main event.

What Kameda loses

The cruelest ledger in this story belongs to the man who did everything right. Kameda (42–5, 23 KOs) is a former WBO bantamweight champion from 2013–14 who last fought in May 2025, losing an IBF title bout to Angelo Leo, per the Philippine Star's account of the weigh-in. He ended an 18-month layoff, completed a full camp, made the championship weight on the first try — and will fly home without a fight, a purse-earning performance, or the title opportunity that was contractually his the moment Figueroa missed. Whether he receives compensation or a direct route to the now-vacant belt remains unconfirmed; the WBA must determine what happens next with a championship its holder surrendered on a scale, per BoxingNews24. For Figueroa (27–2–1, 20 KOs), the costs are clearer and self-inflicted: the title, the defense, the payday's centerpiece slot, and a reputation problem that follows fighters who miss weight into every future negotiation.

The card that remains

The show at The Chelsea goes on, and its top of the bill is intact. Sebastian Fundora (24–1–1, 16 KOs), the 6-foot-5½ southpaw from West Palm Beach by way of Coachella, makes the fourth defense of his WBC super welterweight title against unbeaten mandatory challenger Ermal Hadribeaj (23–0–1, 8 KOs) of Albania, per Fightmag. Both men made weight Friday — Fundora 152.8 pounds, Hadribeaj 152.4 — and Fundora arrives off a sixth-round stoppage of former champion Keith Thurman in March. Armando Reséndiz (16–3, 11 KOs), the all-action former champion from Mexico, is elevated to the co-main event against Australia's Koen Mazoudier (16–4–1, 6 KOs) over 10 rounds at super middleweight, per Fightnews. The televised card opens with unbeaten middleweights Jaime Enrique Osuna Diaz (11–0, 5 KOs) and Cristian Cangelosi (13–0–1, 5 KOs) over eight rounds, and Marco Romero (15–0, 13 KOs) meets Braulio Ferreira (8–3, 3 KOs) in another eight-rounder; Phoenix featherweight David King Garcia (7–0, 5 KOs) faces Angel Carrillo (5–0–1, 2 KOs) on the non-televised portion. Coverage of the fourth installment of PBC's "The Fight" series begins at 8 p.m. ET / 5 p.m. PT on TNT, truTV and DAZN, with the main-event ring walks expected around 11 p.m. ET.

Previously's sports desk previewed this card in this morning's boxing roundup, when Figueroa–Kameda was still a title fight and the only question was whether the champion's pressure would break the veteran. By Saturday afternoon the question had answered itself in the worst available way. Las Vegas stages more big boxing weekends than anywhere on earth, and most of them survive their weigh-ins. This one lost its co-main event and a world title before the first bell — a reminder that in this sport, the first opponent is always the scale.