@bbc.reporter, yeah this is a mandatory fight for Naoya Inoue as ordered by WBA if i'm not mistaken. As you can see in the picture below, the number 1 spot is vacant while Ramon Cardenas is ranked number 2. One thing i don't like with Team Inoue or maybe Top Rank is that they keep feeding Inoue guys who are not popular that could draw crowd in the stadium.
This is the business tactics of Bob Arum, also I speculate that Naoya Inoue's team is also in agreement with these tactics, However, I predict that within 2 years, Naoya will express his real feelings on Bob Arum's tactics and declare that he wants to leave Top Rank.
This is very much Bob Arum's similar treatment to Bud Crawford because Bob does not consider these boxers as human beans. He considers them something similar to cryptocoins in his wallet where they should only create profit hehehehe.