By Dan Ambrose: Former WBA lightweight champion Brandon Rios (32-2-1, 23 KOs) is saying he’ll retire if he loses his next fight. Rios, 28, will likely be facing former WBO light welterweight champion Mike Alvarado (34-3, 23 KOs) in a rubber match next January.
The two fighters have already fought twice with Rios winning the first one in 2012, and Alvarado winning the second fight last year in March. Rios has since lost to Manny Pacquiao last year, and then won a controversial 9th round disqualification victory over Diego Chaves last August.
Rios was in the process of losing that fight as well if not for the disqualification.
“If I lose, which isn’t in my mind, boxing is over. I’ll retire,” Rios says. “I don’t see it [retiring], because I’m not going to [lose].”
In his last four fights, Rios has taken a lot of vicious head shots, and it’s definitely a cause for concern to see him taking so much punishment in his fights. If he does retire, he’d be getting out of the ring at perhaps the right time. He’s made good money and can possibly retire without needing to work.
Rios’ career would definitely be in bad shape if he loses to Alvarado, because it would be Rios’ third defeat in his last four fights, and you can make an argument that it really should be Rios’ 5th loss in his last six fights due to Rios’ controversial wins over Richard Abril and Chaves.
With Rios still being with Top Rank, he’ll still have the opportunity for fights against Manny Pacquiao, Tim Bradley, Jessie Vargas, Ruslan Provodnikov, Terence Crawford and a rematch against Chaves.
As long as Bob Arum of Top Rank doesn’t terminate Rios’ contract due to him losing too many fights, he’ll still be able to make good money with the mixing and matching that Arum likes to do with fighters in his Top Rank stable. Rios may not do very well against Arum’s fighters, but he can definitely make good money against them for the next couple of years.
Ideally, Rio needs to get a good nutritionist and try and find his way back down to lightweight, because he’s not been the same fighter since he moved out of that division. Rios doesn’t match up against the top light welterweights, and definitely not against the top welterweights.
Rios is currently getting in shape for his next fight. He’s looking fleshy right now, and appears to be in the neighborhood of the mid-160s in terms of weight. He’s going to need to lose the weight in order to make 147 for the Alvarado fight.
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