Demetrius Andrade vs. Erislandy Lara possible

By Boxing News - 06/15/2016 - Comments

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(Photo credit Amanda Westcott/SHOWTIME) By Jeff Aranow: Unbeaten Demetrius Andrade (23-0, 16 KOs) put himself in position for a world title shot last Saturday night with his 12th round knockout win over contender Willie Nelson (25-3-1, 15 KOs) at the Turning Stone Resort in Verona, New York. Andrade is now the second mandatory challenger to WBC junior middleweight champion Jermell Charlo.

However, Andrade’s title shot against the 26-year-old Charlo will not be coming soon, because he has another mandatory to get out of the way first against #2 WBC Charles Hatley (26-1-1, 18 KOs) first before he can get to Andrade, according to Dan Rafael.

Andrade’s promoters Artie Pellulo and Joe DeGuardia are interested in speaking with Showtime Sports general manager Stephen Espinoza about matching the 28-year-old Andrade against WBA World junior middleweight champion Erislandy Lara (23-2-2, 13 KOs) for a title shot against him. Andrade is ranked #3 with the WBA, and he would make for an interesting opponent for the Cuban Lara.

Espinoza would likely be interested in seeing a fight between Lara and Andrade, because the fight would attract a great deal of interest from the hardcore boxing fans. It would also give Lara his first quality opponent since his loss to Saul “Canelo” Alvarez two years ago in July 2014. Since that loss, Lara has beaten Ishe Smith, Delvin Rodriguez, Jan Zaveck and Vanes Martirosyan. Those are decent fighters, but none of them is in the class of the southpaw Andrade in the talent department.

“I’m going to ask Stephen if he is interested in doing a fight between Demetrius and Erislandy Lara,” Pelullo said to Dan Rafael at ESPN.com. “Lara and him would be a great fight and the winner of Lara and Andrade could then fight the winner of Charlo and Hatley in a unification fight, which would be even bigger than just Demetrius fighting Charlo for his title. Demetrius wants a title fight next and I want to get it for him, so this was my thought. Now I have to see if it’s something we can do.”

Pellullo is right about a fight between Andrade and Lara being bigger than a match between Jermell Charlo and Andrade. Jermell is seen by a lot of boxing fans as the weaker of the two Charlo brothers, and Andrade will likely have little problems beating him. But a fight between Andrade and Lara would attract a lot more interest, and it would also give Andrade the chance to add a nice scalp to his collection. Lara has been beaten twice in his eight-year pro career in defeats to Canelo and Paul Williams, but both of those defeats were controversial losses.

The only fight that Lara should have lost is his 2011 bout against Carlos Molina, which was scored a 10 round draw. Many of the boxing fans that saw that fight believed that Molina was robbed of a decision win, because he really worked Lara over with body shots. Lara is a good fighter, but he cannot handle being hit to the body. Saul “Canelo” Alvarez and Alfredo Angulo both gave Lara trouble with their body shots.

Andrade would like to fight middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin in the future at some point, but that will only take place if/when Andrade has cleared out the 154lb division.