Mikey Garcia faces Elio Rojas this Saturday on Showtime

By Boxing News - 07/29/2016 - Comments

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(Photo credit: Amanda Westcott/SHOWTIME) By Dan Ambrose: After two and a half years outside of the ring, former two division world champion Mikey Garcia (34-0, 28 KOs) will finally be back in action this Saturday night against light welterweight Elio Rojas (24-2, 14 KOs) in a 10 round fight at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. The Garcia-Rojas fight will be taking place on the Leo Santa Cruz vs. Carl Frampton card.

Mikey, 28, last fought in January 2014 in beating Juan Carlos Burgos by a 12 round unanimous decision. At the time, Mikey was the WBO World super featherweight champion. Burgos hasn’t fought since either.

Mikey Garcia vs. Elio Rojas start time – 9:00 P.M. ET/PT on Showtime Championship Boxing

Where to see it / location: Barclays Center, Brooklyn, New York

Elio Rojas hasn’t fought in the last two years since his eight round decision win over Robert Osiobe in August 2014, so he’s probably just as ring rusty as Mikey. It makes sense for Mikey to be matched against an inactive fighter like himself because he might lose if he gets put in with someone that has been busy with their careers.

Garcia was out of the ring for two years due to him having promotional issues with his former promoter Bob Arum of Top Rank. It was only recently that Garcia was able to get past the problems with his former promoters.

Despite Garcia’s inactivity, he continued to work out in the gym to stay in top condition during his two and a half years out of the ring. With that said, there’s a big difference between just working out at the gym and fighting. Mikey hasn’t had the chance to fight to really test himself in the last two years, and it’s quite possible that he’s lost a lot from his game from inactivity.

“I expect to pick up right where I left off. I was a world champion, I was undefeated, and I still am. I didn’t leave because I was injured. I think I’ll come back even better. I’m hungrier now than I was before,” said Garcia via ESPN.com.

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If Mikey is going to stay at 140, then he’s going to have to compete with WBC/WBO light welterweight champion Terence Crawford, because he’s the biggest name in that weight class. However, it’s unclear whether Crawford’s promoter Bob Arum would be willing to make a fight between them. You’d like to think that Arum would make that fight, but I’m not sure that he would. Mikey might need to move up to 147 to get the bigger fights because the 140lb division is a dead one. If you’re not fighting Crawford or any of the other Top Rank guys like Viktor Postol, there aren’t any interesting fights at light welterweight.

It remains to be seen whether Mikey can get back to the level he was at previously in terms of performance. He was fighting at super featherweight the last time he fought in 2014. He’s now fighting two divisions above that weight class at light welterweight. That’s 10 pounds heavier than before.

Rojas previously held the WBC featherweight title from 2009 to 2010. His status was changed to ‘Champion in Recess’ in 2010. In 2012, Rojas was beaten by Jhonny Gonzalez by a 12 round unanimous decision by the scores 117-111, 116-111 and 116-112. Gonzalez knocked Rojas down in the 10th round with a body shot.

Rojas hasn’t been very busy with his career since 2008. He’s been a part-time fighter for the past eight years. In the last eight years, Rojas has fought just six times. That’s probably one of the main reasons why he was selected to fight Mikey; that and the fact that he’s a former world champion.

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“Even though it’s been 2½ years, I stayed in the gym almost the entire time,” Mikey Garcia said. “I probably took maybe two to three weeks off throughout the entire two-year period. I was always active, always in the gym, and I was doing a lot of sparring, actually.”

Garcia didn’t look all that impressive in his last fight against Burgos or in his fight against Orlando Salido. He won both fights, but he did not look good when being pressured heavily. You can imagine what Mikey is like now with him being out of the ring for nearly three years. It wouldn’t be surprising if he’s lost quite a bit from his game. Rojas probably isn’t good enough or big enough to expose Mikey’s rust to the boxing public, but better fighters will be able to do this.