By Jason Kim: On April 16th, WBC welterweight champion Andre Berto (27-0, 21 Ko’s) will be putting his unbeaten record on the line against the hard hitting southpaw Victor Ortiz (28-2-2, 22 KO’s) in a title bout at the Foxwoods Resort Casino, in Mashantucket, Connecticut.

This fight will be a weeding out process where the loser will have to battle the other contenders for a future shot at a title while the winner of the fight could find himself as a future star in the welterweight division and a leading candidate for a big payday against one of the top fighters.

Berto would likely already be a star by now if he had been taking on better opposition. For whatever reason, Berto’s management has been slow in putting him in with quality opposition and as of yet, Berto really hasn’t fought anyone that you could call a dangerous opponent. As such, Berto’s career has kind of stagnated during the last four years where he hasn’t accomplished much. Ortiz, believe it or not, is a huge leap up in competition for Berto. It’s now or never for Berto. If he can’t win this fight it’s going to really cause problems for his career because so much was expected from him and he’s failed to produce.

Ortiz has done well when matched selectively but in his two toughest fighters against Marcos Maidana and Lamont Peterson, Ortiz has failed to get the win. The good thing about Ortiz is he’s young enough and has good enough tools to be special if he can get his confidence up and pick up an big win over Berto.