Matchroom Boxing, Rodriguez’s promoter, announced Friday that the undefeated, unified junior bantamweight champion will challenge Antonio Vargas on June 13 in Glendale, Arizona. DAZN will stream Rodriguez versus Vargas as a 12-round main event from Desert Diamond Arena.

Vargas (19-1-1, 11 KOs, 1 NC) is expected to defend the WBA 118-pound championship against Rodriguez (23-0, 16 KOs), who owns The Ring, WBA, WBC and WBO 115-pound crowns.

“New weight class, same goals,” Rodriguez said. “Dominate and pick up all the belts. June 13th I look forward to becoming a three-division world champ.”

Matchroom also announced that Rodriguez, ranked fourth on The Ring’s pound-for-pound list, has signed a multi-fight extension with the promotional company headed by Eddie Hearn.

“Matchroom has been my home for the last four years and I can’t wait to keep making history with them by my side,” Rodriguez said. “Many more world titles to win and new divisions to take over.”

The 26-year-old Rodriguez wanted his next fight to take place in his hometown of San Antonio, where he last fought in April 2023. The card wound up in Glendale because Frost Bank Center, Matchroom’s preferred venue, isn’t available the night of June 13 because it’s reserved for the San Antonio Spurs in case the team is still alive in the NBA playoffs.

Rodriguez has drawn well in the Phoenix area, where he has headlined Matchroom cards three times since February 2022.

The left-handed Rodriguez stopped England’s Sunny Edwards after the ninth round of their December 2023 bout at Desert Diamond Arena. His following fight, a seventh-round knockout of esteemed Mexican Juan Francisco Estrada, took place at nearby Footprint Center in Phoenix in June 2024.

Despite facing Vargas, Rodriguez intends to keep his 115-pound championships, at least temporarily, so that he’ll have the flexibility to return to that division.

He wants to eventually challenge the winner of the junior featherweight showdown between undisputed champ Naoya Inoue (32-0, 27 KOs) and Japanese rival Junto Nakatani (32-0, 24 KOs) on May 2 at Tokyo Dome. Rodriguez remains interested, too, in becoming the fully unified junior bantamweight champion, which would require him to defeat the winner of the bout between IBF champ Willibaldo Garcia (23-6-2, 13 KOs) and mandatory challenger Andrew Moloney (28-4, 18 KOs) on June 6 at Aichi Sky Expo in Tokoname, Japan.

Rodriguez, a former IBF/WBO flyweight titleholder, could become a champion in a third division by beating Vargas. He won the WBA 115-pound crown from Argentina’s Fernando Martinez (18-1, 9 KOs), who he knocked out in the 10th round of the co-feature of “The Ring IV: Night of Champions” card November 22 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Vargas, 29, settled for a 12-round unanimous draw with Japan’s Daigo Higa in his most recent action July 30 in Yokohama.

The 2016 U.S. Olympian from Kissimmee, Florida retained the WBA bantamweight title that night. He was elevated from interim champ by the WBA last May, but he was later relegated to champion in recess because a family tragedy prevented him from facing another Japanese opponent, Seiya Tsutsumi, last fall.

Tsutsumi was previously designated the WBA’s bantamweight champion in recess because he could defend his belt against Vargas due to injuries he suffered during his own unanimous draw with Higa (21-3-3, 19 KOs) in February 2025. With Vargas unavailable, Tsutsumi defended the WBA bantamweight crown when he defeated Nonito Donaire by split decision December 17 in Tokyo.

Tsutsumi (13-0-3, 8 KOs) and Vargas were scheduled to fight this past Saturday night on the Tenshin Nasukawa-Estrada undercard in Tokyo, but Tsutsumi hadn’t recovered from injuries sustained during his victory over Donaire, including a facial fracture. The WBA then agreed to sanction Vargas-Rodriguez as a bantamweight title fight.