Brandon Rios could get in title position with win over Mike Alvarado

By Boxing News - 01/02/2015 - Comments

rios8888876By Dan Ambrose: #4 WBO, #10 WBC Brandon Rios (32-2-1, 23 KOs) could find himself in position for world title shot at welterweight if he can get past #10 WBO Mike Alvarado (34-3, 23 KOs) in their rubber match this month on January 24th at the 1stBank Center, in Bloomfield, Colorado, USA.

With Rios’ high rankings, it’s possible he could get moved up a spot or two if he can get past the 34-year-old Alvarado. The sad part about Rios facing WBO champion Manny Pacquiao again is that Rios already fought him in November of 2013 in losing by a lopsided 12 round decision.

I’m not sure that the boxing public is ready for a second fight between Pacquiao and Rios, no matter how far in the future the fight would take place. It’s not a bankable fight.

Rios has won his last fight against Diego Chaves last year in August by a controversial 9th round disqualification. Rios was on the verge of losing the fight by a decision to Chaves when the referee Vic Drakulich stopped the fight in the 9th round and disqualified Chaves for throwing an elbow.

Having watched the 9th round several times, I couldn’t see any instances where Chaves threw an elbow. I even watched it in slow motion and I still couldn’t see where Chaves threw an elbow. Needless to say, Rios was very lucky that the fight was halted by Drakulich because he would have lost that fight to Chaves, and that obviously would messed things up for him and likely his promoters at Top Rank.

While some boxing fans see Rios and Alvarado as played out fighters, many of the fans are excited about seeing them fight. They don’t care that neither of them are what you would call world title caliber fighters at 147. The fans just want to see the two slug it out. Alvarado may throw a wrench in Rios’ works if he’s able to use the same movement that he did in their last fight in March of 2013.

Rios was unable to trap Alvarado long enough to land his big power shots, and this enabled Alvarado to win a 12 round decision. Alvarado has shown no ability to move for 12 rounds in his last two fights against Ruslan Provodnikov and Juan Manuel Marquez. If Alvarado stands stationary in front of Rios like he did against Provodnikov and Marquez, then it’s safe to say that Rios will knock him out like he did in their first fight in 2012.



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