By Dan Ambrose: Mikey Garcia will be facing light welterweight contender Sandor Martin on October 16th in the headliner on DAZN. Hopefully, this tune-up for Mikey leads to bigger and better things for him and especially for DAZN.
Sandor, a fighter with a 32.5 KO percentage, has fought mostly second-tier opposition throughout his 10-year professional career. He stepped it up a couple of times and was beaten by Anthony Yigit and Alexandre Lepelley. Yigit was recently knocked out in seven rounds by Rolando ‘Rolly’ Romero on July 17th.
The fact that the likes of Yigit beat Sandor Martin shows you how far Mikey Garcia is dipping down to find an easy mark for his tune-up.
It’s not a great fight, but it appears Mikey wants another tune-up before he starts fighting elite-level opposition once again.
It’s been two years since Mikey fought a quality opponent in Errol Spence, and didn’t go well for him.
The former four-division world champion Mikey wasted a lot of time in the last 19 months, calling out Manny Pacquiao instead of shooting for a more realistic fight against Regis Prograis, who wants to fight him.
Pacquiao might have given Mikey a fight if the California native was staying active with his career. Mikey used to be a good fighter before settling into a sedentary lifestyle, talking cars, and eating well.
Prograis was talking up a fight with Mikey, but it’s not going to happen. Mikey has chosen to take another tune-up against the little-known Spanish fighter Sandor Martin (38-2, 13 KOs), ranked#7 WBA, #8 WBC, #12 WBO at 140.
Former WBA light welterweight champion Prograis was upset when he learned that Mikey wouldn’t be fighting him next because he had been under the belief that he would face him.
Sandor’s best wins:
- Joe Hughes
- Adam Mate
- Mauro Maximiliano Godoy
- Steve Jamoye
It would be interesting to know how much DAZN is paying Mikey for his fight with Martin. He was rumored to have gotten $7 million for his last tune-up against past his prime Jessie Vargas last year.
If Mikey is getting that kind of money to fight Sandor, there’s no point in him trying to fight someone good like Prograis or undisputed light welterweight champion Josh Taylor.
The money Mikey got last year is close to the $10 million that Caleb Plant is getting to take on Canelo Alvarez. Jessie Vargas isn’t a big name. He was just a one-hit-wonder, a guy that briefly held the WBO 147-lb title after beating Sadam Ali in 2016.
Mikey, 33, will be seeing action for the first in 20 months, and yeah, it’s another tune-up for him like his previous fight against Jessie Vargas.
ESPN’s Mike Coppinger reports that the former four-division world champion Mikey (40-1, 30 KOs) has agreed to the deal to fight on an Eddie Hearn promoted card on DAZN.
Originally, Hearn had planned on stagging the trilogy match between WBA/WBC super flyweight champion Juan Francisco Estrada and Roman ‘Chocolatito’ Gonzalez for the October 16th date on DAZN.
Unfortunately, Chocolatito came down with COVID-19, resulting in the fight with Estrada being moved off the October 16th date. They’re now looking at scheduling the Estrada vs. Chocolatito 3 fight in November on a still to be determined date.
We’ll have to see what comes next for Mikey after he beats Sandor Martin. Will DAZN insist that Mikey fight someone good next time out like Prograis, or will they let him continue to take tune-up level fights?
“Sources: Mikey Garcia has agreed to a deal for an Oct. 16 main event on DAZN promoted by Eddie Hearn. The likely opponent is Spain’s Sandor Martin. Hearn was planning the trilogy fight between Juan Francisco Estrada and Roman Gonzalez on Oct. 16, but Chocolatito contracted COVID. Estrada signed the contract for the trilogy fight, per sources. Gonzalez’s promoter, Mr. Honda, committed to the fight in writing. The 115-pound title bout could now land in November,” said @MikeCoppinger.