By James Slater: It looks like former middleweight king Kelly Pavlik, now training in California with Robert Garcia, could make his ring return in Las Vegas on April 14th, on the under-card of the mouth-watering Yuriorkis Gamboa-Brandon Rios clash at The Mandalay Bay. According to a piece on Youngstown News, Pavlik could face never-stopped Scott Sigmon, 21-3(12) over a scheduled ten-rounds at a 166-pound catch-weight.
The fight is yet to be signed, yet the date, the opponent and the weight and distance of the bout are all set. Pavlik just needs to agree to the fight and sign the contract. Promoter Bob Arum’s grand plan is for “The Ghost” to win the April fight, then have one more rust-remover, before going into a big fight with unbeaten WBC middleweight champ Julio Cesar Chavez Junior.
“He has a lot of rust,” Arum said of the former middleweight ruler. “We want to see how he handles the weight. If it looks like he’s back, then we make a pay-per-view fight against Chavez.”
So, as long as Pavlik takes the April 14th fight, looks good and then looks good again in a second comeback fight, he could get himself a chance at becoming a WBC champ all over again. But can Pavlik, 37-2(32) make 160-pounds these days? Actually, can Chavez Jr, make 160-pounds again? The Mexican star sure struggled with the weight going into his bout with Marco Antonio Rubio, coming into the ring at 181-pounds!
If Pavlik-Chavez does get made, however, I’d have to give Pavlik a decent shot at winning the fight. Assuming, of course, Pavlik doesn’t look a faded or old fighter in his planned tune-ups, I’d even give him a shot at stopping “The Son Of The Legend.” Chavez Junior is there to be hit, he had his hands full with Rubio, and Pavlik, if he still has the firepower that saw him take out Jermain Taylor and Edison Miranda, could prove too strong and powerful for the 25-year-old.
Pavlik was recently quoted as saying he would “chop off a leg to get a fight with Chavez Junior.” If Chavez is as keen as Pavlik (Arum sure sounds as though he wants to make the fight) and if Kelly can look good in those two planned return bouts, we could have an exciting middleweight showdown sometime in the summer. After all he’s been through, it would be some storybook comeback if Pavlik were to reach the top again.