Brandon Rios congratulates Humberto Soto for win

By Boxing News - 02/24/2019 - Comments

Image: Brandon Rios congratulates Humberto Soto for win

By Allan Fox: Brandon ‘Bam Bam’ Rios (35-5-1, 26 KOs) showed class in congratulating Humberto “Zorrita” Soto (69-9-2 37 KOs) for his upset 12 round unanimous decision win over him last Saturday night in their fight on DAZN. The fight was one of the most exciting of 2019, and easily one of the best if not best on DAZN since they started streaming boxing.

Rios didn’t make mention of whether or not he’ll retire from boxing. He’s only 32, but he’d already been retired for a year and a half after his loss to Tim Bradley in 2015. Rios came back in 2017, and had won two out of his last three fights before losing last Saturday to 38-yer-old former two division world champion Soto by the scores 119-111, 118-112 and 118-112.

If Rios is going to continue his boxing career, then he needs to be matched carefully by Matchroom promoter Eddie Hearn, or whoever promotes him once his contract retires. The last fight that Rios had against Ramon ‘Inocente’ Alvarez was perfect match-making. Alvarez wasn’t in the same class as Rios so he ended up losing to him. But last night’s fight against the well schooled Soto was a mismatch in terms of terms of technical ability. Soto was far too talented than Rios. It didn’t matter that Soto had spent most of his career at super featherweight. He had all that ability going for him, and that enabled him to make up for his lack of size and youth.

The fight took place n Soto’s hometown in Tijuana, Mexico at the Auditorio Municipal. It wasn’t a hometown decision, though. Soto did more than enough to rate the win. If Rios had a problem with the decision, he would have likely spoken up about it.

Rios still has something left in the tank, but not as a welterweight. Rios’ performances against Soto, Bradley, Danny Garcia, Manny Pacquiao and Diego Chaves showed that he’s not cut out for the 147 lb weight class. Rios should have lost all those fights, even the Chaves one. Rios was losing the Chaves fight with one to go when the referee disqualified Diego without warning for him throwing an elbow. Talk about your lucky breaks for Rios. But that fight, as his losses to Bradley, Garcia and Soto, showed that Rios is in the wrong division. If Rios lacks the discipline to melt down to 140 or 135, then he should retire, because he’s not in position to get a title shot against any of the welterweight champions.

One fight out there that could be an interesting one for Rios would be against Victor Ortiz. Those two have talked about fighting each other in the past, but they never did. Perhaps now would be a good time for them to face each other before one or both can longer take the fight.