It’s official. Former world titleholders Devon Alexander and Victor Ortiz will go head-to-head as both look to climb back up the welterweight mountain top. The southpaws will face off on a Feb. 17 PBC on Fox card at the Don Haskins Center in El Paso, Texas, per an ESPN report.
Alexander, formerly one of the best junior welterweights out there, has seen his career drift in the past few years. He’s openly admitted to substance abuse issues which he had to sort out, but says he’s now ready to regain form and make a push for another world title. Alexander (27-4, 14 KOs) has lost three of his last five fights, dropping decisions to Shawn Porter, Amir Khan, and Aaron Martinez before taking a hiatus from the sport.
Ortiz (32-6-2, 25 KOs) has also found himself on the fringes of the sport in recent years (particularly considering that he was once being groomed to be Golden Boy’s star attraction, prior to Canelo Alvarez). Most already know the story about how that turned out though, with Ortiz catching a ton of heat for being a ‘quitter’ ever since he faced Marcos Maidana back in 2009.
The 30-year-old Ortiz has shown that for all the talent he has, his heart isn’t fully in the fight game anymore. And it seems that any time he gets touched on the jaw that was fractured by Josesito Lopez, he remembers why — as evidenced in his recent knockout losses to Luis Collazo and Andre Berto.
Anyway, in terms of a crossroads match, this is as legit as they come. Here we have two fighters fighting to regain relevance in the welterweight division, with the loser unlikely to ever get another chance to make it back to the pinnacle.
The event’s co-feature will have Caleb Plant (16-0, 10 KOs) taking on “Porky” Medina (38-8, 32 KOs) in a super middleweight world title eliminator, and the card will begin in the early evening so that it doesn’t conflict with Showtime’s Garcia-Rios card, scheduled to begin at 9pm.
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