By Dan Ambrose: Photo credit: Tom Casino/Showtime – With his year off from boxing and a short stint in the Betty Ford clinic to treat an alcohol problem, former WBC/WBO middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik (36-2, 32 KO’s) will be fighting for the first time in over a year when he goes up against little known Alfonso Lopez (21-0, 16 KO’s) on Saturday night in a 10 round bout at the MGM Grand, in Las Vegas, Nevada. Pavlik has got a lot of pressure on him to look good in this fight and dominate the 28-year-old Lopez.

The problem is compounded by the fact that Pavlik opted to face a 2nd tier obscure fighter like Lopez rather than a contender for his first fight since losing by a 12 round decision to Sergio Martinez last year in April. Lopez is someone that few boxing fans have ever heard of and by having this fight put on Showtime pay-per-view, boxing fans are going to expect a lot for the $55 they plunked down to buy this high priced card. The card has few appealing fights on on with even the main event between Manny Pacquiao and Shane Mosley lacking. But Pavlik has no margin for error in his fight with Lopez. Pavlik must win and must look good.

Speaking in a conference call, Pavlik said “Fighters with four or five losses can get away with a year-and-a-half layoff and people will say they look good. If I come back and don’t perform at the top of the top, it’s going to be brutal. This is one of the most important fights of my career, believe it or not.”

Pavlik is right. He’s coming off of a long time off from boxing and is moving up in weight to super middleweight so that he can make weight without draining down like he was at middleweight. However, Pavlik struggled in his fight with Bernard Hopkins in 2008 when Pavlik fought Hopkins at a 169 pound catchweight. Pavlik was too slow at this weight and couldn’t dominate Hopkins like he had done at middleweight against the marginal opposition.