By Dan Ambrose: The fight between former WBC lightweight champion Humberto Soto (57-7-2, 34 KO’s) and Lucas Matthysse (30-2, 28 KO’s) has found a place on the June 23rd undercard of the Andre Berto vs. Victor Ortiz 2 rematch at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, California. Soto, 31, must first get by former lightweight Claudinei Lacerda (14-2, 10 KO’s) in a scheduled 10 round bout at the Oasis Hotel Complex, in Cancun, Mexico.

This continues Soto’s trend of facing former lightweights for his fights instead of light welterweights since moving up to the light welterweight division in September 2011. Soto has twice since moving up in weight, beating Jose Alfaro and Adailton De Jesus.

I like Soto as a fighter, but I think he’s going to be in over his head when he faces Matthysse, who isn’t a lightweight nor a pumped up lightweight like the guys that Soto for some reason keeps fighting, as if he’s still not sure whether he wants to get his feet wet against a legitimate light welterweight. It’s going to be a huge shock for Soto when he does end up facing Matthysse, because he’s bigger and stronger than anyone Soto has fought in a long, long time.

Soto went life and death with Urbano Antillon in a narrow 12 round decision in December 2010. The fight begged for a rematch, but Soto instead went another direction, facing lesser names and easier opponents. Mattysse would likely blast out and make easy work of Antillon. He could beat him slugging him into submission or out-boxing him. Matthysse can do either, because he’s got great boxing skills and excellent power.

Although Matthysse has lost two out of his last five fights in defeats against Zab Judah and Devon Alexander, you can still consider him undefeated because he handled both of those fighters and appeared to win both of those fights. However, Matthysse’s mistake was to fight Judah and Alexander in their home arenas, where it put him in a situation where he may have needed to do even more than just beat them to get a decision.

Soto will likely lose this fight by knockout if he tries to slug with the stronger Matthysse. If he tries to box him, that’ll also play in Matthysse’s hands because he’s an arguably better boxer than Soto.