By Jeff Aranow: A unification fight appears to be in the works for WBC World lightweight champion Mikey Garcia (36-0, 30 KOs) against the winner of next month’s rematch between WBA World lightweight champion Jorge Linares (41-3, 27 KOs) and Anthony Crolla (31-5-3, 13 KOs) at the Manchester Arena in Manchester, England.
Not only is Linares the WBA champion, he’s also the World Boxing Council Champion in Recess, which enables him to get a crack at Mikey if he wants the fight.
Linares, 31, has already beaten Crolla as of last year in beating him by a 12 round unanimous decision in Manchester, England. However, Crolla wanted a rematch, so now the two of them are doing it again. If Linares beats Crolla a second time, he’ll still likely keep pushing for rematches. As long as the fights are close, Crolla will likely want more rematches and his promoters might keep giving them to him.
“It would be a very interesting fight between us,” said Linares via fightnews.com about a fight against Mikey Garcia. “We’ll see what happens if he decides to stay at 135 pounds. If he does, we’ll possibly fight this year.”
Mikey destroyed WBC lightweight champion Dejan Zlaticanin (22-1, 15 KOs) by a 3rd round knockout last Saturday night on January 28 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada. The fight was supposed to have been a competitive fight, but Mikey dominated Zlaticanin and knocking him completely out cold in the 3rd round with a right to the head. Zlaticanin never knew what hit him in the 3rd round after Mikey nailed him with a big right to the head.
Linares might not get past Crolla a second time unless he really dominates the fight. Linares will be the visiting fighter once again, and he barely got credit for the win the last time he fought Crolla. The judges scored the fight 115-114, 115-113 and 117-111.
The only score out of the bunch that made any sense was the 117-111. The other two judges had the fight scored closer than it actually appeared to be. You can argue that the crowd noise may have influenced the judges to score the fight closer. Linares may not get the decision the next time around against Crolla. Crolla hasn’t said whether he’ll fight Mikey if he beats Linares. That’s who Mikey may need to fight him because it’s going to be be tough for Linares to get a second win over Crolla in his hometown of Manchester. Linares got lucky the last time, but I think his luck may run out the second time.