By Eric Thomas: Unbeaten #3 WBC Vanes Martirosyan (32-0, 20 KO’s) will finally be facing his first quality opponent of his career when he takes on #2 WBC Erislandy Lara (17-1-1, 11 KO’s) in a WBC 154 pound final eliminator bout on November 10th at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada.

The winner of the Lara-Martirosyan fight will become the mandatory challenger for WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez, although they’ll have to wait around to fight him until next year some time if they’re lucky. Golden Boy Promotions will likely draw it out for as long as possible before they put their young star Alvarez in with either Lara or Martirosyan.

Lara, 29, looks like a solid favorite to beat the 26-year-old Martirosyan. He can do everything that Martirosyan, but much better. Martirosyan is a really good fighter, but he has problems against guys with accurate punches and fast hands. We saw Martirosyan win a controversial decision against a past his best Kassim Ouma in January 2010, and he’s not faced anyone even half as good as Ouma since then.

Going from the likes of 41-year-old Troy Lowry and 34-year-old journeyman Richard Gutierrez to a fight against Lara is going to be a huge leap up in competition for the Top Rank promoted Martirosyan. He’s going to have problems with that change in competition, because Martirosyan has dined on soft opposition through pretty much his entire career with the exception of his fight against Ouma. It’s gotten especially bad lately for Martirosyan with him taking on Lowry, Gutierrez, Saul Roman and Bladimir Hernandez, all mismatches that did nothing to help Martirosyan progress as a fighter.

The southpaw Lara has looked great in his last three fights, losing a controversial 12 round decision to Paul Williams, and beating Ronald Hearns by a 1st round knockout and defeating Freddy Hernandez by a lopsided 10 round decision.