Xander Zayas attended Sebastian Fundora's fight with Chordale Booker four months ago in hopes of facing him for his two junior middleweight titles this summer at Madison Square Garden.

Negotiations never resulted in representatives for Fundora and Zayas reaching a deal. They went in different directions, which left Zayas, who was the mandatory challenger for Fundora's WBO 154-pound championship, to watch him fight Tim Tszyu again on television on Saturday night.

Zayas, who will fight this Saturday for the WBO belt Fundora relinquished, wasn't as taken aback as some onlookers by Tszyu not answering the bell to start the eighth round at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. The undefeated Zayas saw him as a very vulnerable opponent for Fundora due to the brutal beating Tszyu took two fights earlier against IBF champion Bakhram Murtazaliev.

"I did watch the fight on Saturday," Zayas told The Ring, "and [Fundora] did what he needed to do."

Fundora dropped Tszyu with a straight left hand in the first round of their 12-round rematch. Tszyu, who stands eight inches shorter than the 6-foot-6 Fundora, also had much more difficulty getting inside to land flush punches on a southpaw extremely tall for the 154-pound division.

Fundora (23-1-1, 15 KOs) used his height and reach more effectively than he did during their first fight. The WBC junior middleweight champion was particularly accurate with his left hand, which made Australia's Tszyu reluctant to trade with an opponent he'd hit rather easily in the first two rounds of their March 2024 bout. An awkward collision with Fundora's elbow opened a catastrophic cut near the middle of Tszyu's hairline to change the tone of that fight.

Tszyu (25-3, 18 KOs) started to land right hands of his own during an action-packed seventh round Saturday night. After taking his fair share of punches in that round as well, the Sydney native quit on his stool.

The 30-year-old Tszyu's decision surprised those that heard him consistently discuss his willingness to die in the ring and why he would never ask out of a fight. Zayas, of Sunrise, Florida, saw Tszyu as a damaged boxer before he fought Fundora the second time. He didn't think twice about Kostya Tszyu's oldest son declining to continue in their Premier Boxing Champions pay-per-view co-feature.

"I wasn't surprised," Zayas said. "He's been in a couple of wars lately. Obviously, after his second-to-last fight, when he got knocked out [by Murtazaliev], he hasn't been the same. I'm not surprised. He didn't have the footwork to get around the punches, so I was expecting [him to quit] or maybe a knockout.”

Russia's Murtazaliev (23-0, 17 KOs) brutalized Tszyu, who was knocked down four times in a fight he lost by third-round technical knockout on Oct. 19 in Orlando, Florida.

Zayas (21-0, 13 KOs) will try to win the WBO junior middleweight title Fundora gave up when he meets Mexico's Jorge Garcia (33-4, 26 KOs) in New York. ESPN will televise their 12-round fight as the main event of a tripleheader from The Theater at Madison Square Garden (9 p.m. ET).