So if Mashiba's purpose for beating Kimura was to be built up to be fed to a random gangster guy who is 50/50 on if we'll ever see him in the story again, then it really makes Kimura not winning a Japanese title even more egregious.
Really, the whole "everyone in Japan fails except Takamura" subtle arc that the author's had going on in the background for hundreds of chapters now looks all the more stupid when Japan's produced DOZENS of world champion boxers in the decades since this thing has started and thats not even getting into Inoue becoming a star and top P4P threat amongst anyone who knows anything about boxing. Can Japanese sports manga authors PLEASE break out of this "Brave little underdog Japan" mindset and get into the 21st century with the rest of us.