By Kevin Chittenden: Negotiations between WBA lightweight champion Brandon Rios and Mike Alvarado are reportedly moving slowly for their March 30th rematch that Top Rank promoter Bob Arum wants. According to RingTV, the two haven’t agreed on the money split for the fight and that’s causing the negotiations to slow. Rios says he’d like to face one of the following fighters instead: Lucas Matthysse, Danny Garcia, Tim Bradley or Amir Khan.
The likelihood of Rios facing any of those guys isn’t good at this time due to a number of reasons. Arum can probably match Rios up with Bradley since their both with Top Rank, but Bradley is already in negotiations with Yuriorkis Gamboa and there’s a slight chance that Bradley could be Floyd Mayweather Jr’s next opponent. That’s a really, really slight chance that Bradley gets that fight, but there’s always hope, right?
Rios mostly wants to face Danny Garcia for his World Boxing Council 140 pound title, but for that to happen Arum would have to reach out to Golden Boy Promotions and work with them on the fight. Will that happen? Probably not. Rios is in a bad situation because he wants to fight Golden Boy fighters Matthysse, Garcia and Khan but that’s not going to happen unless Arum can work with Golden Boy. They’re not going to hand Rios a fight just because he’s asking for it.
Rios is in a position where Arum wants him to fight a guy he just knocked out in the 7th round last October. That obviously isn’t an appealing option for Rios, and you have to wonder what fights Arum has for Rios in the future. There’s been talk of Rios facing Manny Pacquiao at some point in time, but with Pacquiao fighting a possible tune-up in April and then Juan Manuel Marquez in September, Rios won’t be in the equation until possibly 2014 if Pacquiao is still fighting by then.
What is Arum going to do with Rios for the remainder of 2013? He can’t keep matching him against Mike Alvarado for lack of other opponents to put him in with. Marquez probably isn’t going to waste his time fighting him, and it’s not likely Rios will ever face Richard Abril again to clear up the controversy about that fight.