By Dan Ambrose: Former IBF welterweight champion Kermit Cintron (32-3-1, 28 KO’s) will finally be getting back in the ring after a year’s absence to fight fringe junior middleweight contender Carlos Molina (18-4-2, 6 KO’s) in a scheduled 10 round bout at the Home Depot Center, in Carson, California. This is a pretty tough bout for the 31-year-old Cintron, as he hasn’t fought since he dove out of the ring last year a 4th round technical decision loss to Paul Williams.

Molina, 27, has been more active than Cintron and recently looked excellent in fighting to a controversial 10 round draw with highly thought of prospect Erislandy Lara in March. Molina hasn’t lost a fight since 2007 when he was narrowly beaten by Mike Alvarado in an 8 round decision defeat.

Cintron has fought good at times in the past several years, but was stopped by Antonio Margarito in a 6th round TKO loss in 2008. In 2009, Cintron fought to a very controversial 12 round draw with Sergio Martinez. Cintron perhaps should have been knocked out in that fight when he was dropped by a left hand from Martinez but was able to argue and convince the referee that his knockdown was from a headbutt, not a punch.

Cintron was clearly knocked down from a punch. At the very least, Martinez should have been given a knockdown and with the points from that knockdown, he would have beaten Cintron. Other than that fight, Cintron beat Alfredo Angulo by a 12 round decision in 2009, but then followed that up with a win over little known Juliano Ramos. However, the fight against Williams last year was another controversial bout involving Cintron. In the 4th round, Cintron appeared to trip over Williams’ leg, causing him to fall out of the ring.

What made fans wonder about Cintron was the fact that he didn’t get back in the ring. A lot of boxing fans felt that Cintron faked an injury and used the opportunity to get out of having to fight Williams. To be fair, Cintron did fall hard and landed on the hard floor next to the ring. Falling that far, it’s hard to imagine Cintron not getting hurt in some way or another. But nevertheless, with Cintron’s fight with Martinez being on the back of many boxing fans’ minds, they saw Cintron faking the injury.

Cintron is taking a big risk in fighting Molina in his first fight back, because this is a guy that can take a good punch and keep returning fire. If Cintron can’t get Molina out of there, he may have to try and box his way to victory. Molina is a better inside fighter than Cintron and if he’s able to pressure him hard the way that he did Lara, Cintron might wear down and lose.