Jorge Linares vs. Abner Cotto – Preview

By Boxing News - 09/28/2018 - Comments

Image: Jorge Linares vs. Abner Cotto – Preview

By Mike Smith: Jorge Linares (44-4, 27 KOs) will be fighting tonight against Abner Cotto (23-3, 12 KOs) in a 12 round fight that will be streamed on Facebook Watch at the Fantasy Springs Casino in Indio, California.

(Photo credit: Tom Hogan – Hoganphotos/Golden Boy Promotions)

Linares, 33, is in need of a confidence booster after losing to Vasyl Lomachenko in his last fight by a 10th round knockout on May 12. Linares knocked Lomachenko down in the 6th round, but he was eventually stopped by the 2-time Olympic gold medalist in round 10 after getting hit with a body shot.

This is a new beginning for Linares in fighting at light welterweight. Perhaps he can win a fourth division world title if he’s successful.

Linares weighed in at 137.4 pounds at last Friday. The 31-year-old Cotto weighed in at 137.8 pounds. Fighting a 140 is going to put Linares in the crosshairs of fighters like Jose Ramirez, Regis Prograis, Maurice Hooker, Alex Saucedo and Josh Taylor. Linares has had problems in the past in facing fighters with punching power at 135 in losses to Antonio DeMarco, Sergio Thompson and Lomachenko. Moving up to 140 is going to be a huge problem for Linares if he intends on facing anyone with the slightest bit of talent.

“My new division, 140, I think it’s a good thing for me going up. I’m ready for that. I want a title in a fourth division,” Linares said to RingTV.com. “I’m focused on this Saturday and maybe next year I can make good fight for new title match.”

Linares best bet is to go after WBO light welterweight champion Maurice Hooker if he’s still a champion by the time he gets a crack at a world title at 140. The IBF and WBA titles are about to be unified in the upcoming World Boxing Super Series light welterweight tournament. Either Regis Prograis or Josh Taylor is expected to have those two titles soon. Either of those two are bad match-ups for Linares. WBC light welterweight champion Jose Ramirez is a winnable fight for Linares, but not an easy one. There’s a good chance Linares loses to Ramirez if that fight ever comes off.

Linares needs to make sure he doesn’t lose tonight against Abner Cotto, because this is a guy with some power that has nothing to lose. Cotto has won his last five fights and stopped four of them. Although he hasn’t knocked out anyone that you can call a good fighter, but he’s still shown the kind of power that could give Linares a lot of problems. Cotto’s losses have come against good fighters in Javier Fortuna, Francisco Vargas and Omar Figueroa. Those are fighters that would have a chance of beating Linares. If you take those guys away from Cotto’s resume, he’s an unbeaten fighter with some solid wins over the likes of Jerry Belmontes.

Before Linares’ loss to Lomachenko, he had important wins over Anthony Crolla, Kevin Mitchell, Luke Campbell and Mercito Gesta. Linares had won 13 straight at the time he lost to Lomachenko. He was fighting at a high level at 135. It’s unclear why Linares chose to move up to 140 when he was doing so well at lightweight. The good thing that Linares has going for him tonight is he’s not facing a natural 140 pounder in Cotto, a cousin of former four division world champion Miguel Cotto. Abner has fought most of his career at lightweight. He only moved up to 140 in 2016.