By Dan Ambrose: WBO bantamweight champion Jorge Arce (59-6-2, 45 KO’s) will be defending his title against 41-year-old Giovanni Andrade (62-13, 50 KO’s) on February 18th at the Palenque de la Feria, Durango, Durango, Mexico.

Andrade is a replacement opponent for Lorenzo Parra, who the World Boxing Organization refused to sanction him as an opponent for Arce because he wasn’t ranked in the top 15 by the WBO.

According to the WBO, they won’t sanction this fight. Arce’s fight with Andrade when he’s not ranked in the top 15 either.

This fight shapes up to be a big mismatch. Arce is still fighting quite, as we’ve seen with his recent wins over Wilfredo Vazquez Jr. and Angky Angkota, whereas Andrade isn’t nearly as well, having been knocked out in the 1st round last May against Macbute Sinyabi in South Africa.

It’s disappointing that a better replacement opponent couldn’t be found than Andrade. There’s got to be at least one contender from the top 15 that should be interested in fighting for the title.

Andrade has an impressive knockout record to be sure. However, most of those wins have come against lower quality fighters. His record is almost completely padded. Each time Andrade would step it up, he would get knocked out. He would then go back to fighting lower level fighters and resume doing well.

Andrade has losses to Celestino Caballero, Takalani Ndlovu, Wladimir Sidorenko, Johnny Tapia, Rey Bautista, Martin Honorio, Juan Manuel Lopez and Guillermo Rigondeaux. As far as big wins go, I can’t see any on his record, not one.