Next Champion is Round 1137 of Jōji Morikawa's Hajime no Ippo manga series.
Details[]
- Characters Introduced: Lord
- Title Page Character(s): Tatsuya Kimura
Summary[]
Just as Kimura blows away his opponent's guard and was about to land another hit, the first round ends. At Kimura's corner, Kimura thinks on how he looks up to Aoki now, since all this time, he has a desire to fight someone and doesn't want to retire until he fights him. Kimura wants to be with Aoki as a boxer until the very end as they have been together for this long. As the second round begins, Kimura overpowers his opponent with left and rights. As the audience cheers, a man tells the audience to not underestimate Kimura. The man notes that while Kimura's record may not be remarkable, he has above average speed, footwork, and punching power. He adds that Kimura's match against Mashiba was where he looked the strongest despite him losing that match. Having come to the venue for three years and watching Kimura's matches, he has always had faith that Kimura would become champion one day. The man gets the audience to shout "next champ" as a cheer for Kimura. The cheers last up to the eighth round, where Kimura begins to look very exhausted. Kimura throws a one-two, clinch combination, resulting into jeers. Kimura pushes his opponent down with him, causing a double down. As the audience notice the match has turned into a mud wrestling match, Takamura laughs in joy. Kimura manages to clinch him again after his opponent's second told him to look at how bad Kimura's legs are shaking it to make him go after him, not noticing that Kimura's arms were going to clinch him. Another double down happens, and the match ends with a draw. The audience wants to question the man, however, the man left with a bunch of beer cans next to where he was sitting. Shinoda scolds Kimura as Kimura claims he was fine as long as he didn't lose. Walking away from the ring, Kimura wonders if Aoki wants Iga to be the one to retire him and plans to stick with him until the end.
Trivia[]
Kimura's correct record in the volume release.
- In the Weekly Shōnen Magazine version, the man in the audience mentions that Tatsuya Kimura's record was 24 Fights - 15 wins, 6 losses, 1 draw, and 9 KO's, which only adds up to 22 matches. Kimura's actual record at that point, was 24 Fights - 15 wins, 6 losses, 3 draws, and 9 KO's. The volume 115 release corrects the error.