Vargas and Salido make weight

By Boxing News - 06/03/2016 - Comments

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(Photo credit: Chris Farina/Team Salido) By Jim Dower: WBC super featherweight champion Francisco Vargas (23-0-1, 17 KOs) weighed in successfully on Friday in coming in at 129.6 pounds for his first defense of his WBC title against #3 WBC Orlando “Siri” Salido (43-13-3, 30 KOs) for their fight on Saturday night on HBO Championship Boxing at the StubHub Center in Carson, California.

Salido, 30, weighed in right at the super featherweight upper limit at 130lbs. You have to wonder how much weight Salido will gain back after he rehydrates. He looked really big fight his fight against Vasyl Lomachenko a couple of years when he weighed in heavy for that fight, and then ballooned up in weight after the weigh-in. Lomachenko was arguably beaten by weight more than by the talent of Salido.

“Being well known for the great fights I give, really motivates me to keep moving forward,” said Vargas to wbcboxing.com. “The confrontation I had to conquer the championship against Takashi Miuras, was considered the best fight of the year. This fight with ‘Siri’ Salido won’t be an exception,” said Vargas.

Vargas, 31, has the youth advantage in the fight over the 35-year-old Salido. However, that might not be enough. Vargas struggled in his last fight against 32-year-old Takashi Miura (30-3-2, 23 KOs) last November at the Mandalay Bay Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada. Vargas was getting beaten up by Miura in the first half of the fight.

Vargas was dropped in the 4th, and things looked bleak for him as the rounds went by. However, Miura tired out and this enabled Vargas to get back into the fight and come back to score a ninth round stoppage win. Vargas could have problems against Salido if he’s able to take the fight him early the way that Miura did.

Salido was robbed of a 12 round decision in his last fight against Roman “Rocky” Martinez last September in Las Vegas. Salido dominated the fight from start to finish but found himself on the receiving end up a controversial 12 round draw. The draw enabled Martinez to keep his WBO super featherweight title despite the fact that he was soaking up punishment for 12 rounds.

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Vargas has the youth advantage in this fight and far fewer years as a pro than Salido, who has been fighting in the pro ranks for 20 years compared to just six for Vargas. Having more experience is nice up to a point, but when you’ve had too many wars then it’s not a good thing. Vargas might win tomorrow night due to him being the fresher of the two fighters rather than him being better than a prime version of Salido.

Other weights on the card:

Julian Ramirez 125.4 vs. Abraham Lopez 125.6
Gabriel Rosado 159.8 vs. Antonio Gutierrez 159