This Saturday's Showtime double-header featuring Abner Mares facing Eric Morel and Anselmo Moreno taking on David De La Mora has plenty of familiar names on the undercard, part of which will be shown on Showtime Extreme starting at 7 p.m. EDT. The main card goes live on Showtime at 9:30 p.m. EDT.
[ Related: Mares vs Morel, Moreno vs De La Mora Quotes ]
Three-time super middleweight title challenger Librado Andrade will be back in action on Showtime Extreme, taking on Florida's Rowland Bryant in a 10-round bout. Andrade (30-4, 23 KO) has come up short in his series of attempts at landing world titles, as he was blown out by Mikkel Kessler back in 2007, lost controversially to Lucian Bute in 2008, and then was knocked out in four by Bute in a rematch 13 months later in November 2009.
Since losing again to Bute, the 33-year-old Andrade has continued to have his struggles, and a couple of odd turns of events. He beat Eric Lucas in May 2010, but followed that with a close and debatable loss to Aaron Pryor Jr a year later. A win last August over club fighter Matt O'Brien proved little, other than Andrade can take shots against anyone and can beat low-level opponents.
After the O'Brien fight, Andrade had a title eliminator set in Mexico against Don George, but George pulled out of the fight on the day of when the ring was too small. Andrade was then offered the same IBF eliminator against Adonis Stevenson, but passed on the fight in order to get himself back in shape, he told Jake Donovan. Stevenson will also be in action this weekend, facing Noe Gonzalez on Friday Night Fights.
With Bryant (15-1, 10 KO), Andrade probably has the patsy they're looking for. He's a 32-year-old Florida club guy who has fought all of twice since 2006, and just once since 2009. That came last August, when he beat a guy who was 0-13 in West Virginia, where as you know all the greats fight.
Also featured on SHO Extreme will be 27-year-old Mexican super featherweight prospect Francisco Vargas (9-0-1, 7 KO). Vargas hasn't faced anyone good yet, and won't start on Saturday, but he will be facing a guy who does nothing but lose to prospects these days in Rafael Lora, a 26-year-old Dominican from New Jersey currently riding a seven-fight losing streak.
Over those seven fights, Lora (11-7, 5 KO) has lost to Matt Remillard (TKO-4), Remillard again (RTD-3), Adrien Broner (TKO-1), Joselito Collado (SD-6), Ramon Valadez (UD-6), Michael Franco (UD-8), and Jorge Diaz (TKO-3). He keeps getting the calls because he's tough, but not too tough, and decent, but not very good, and he can't really punch. He's the sort of test that any decent prospect is designed to pass with flying colors, basically. Collado struggled with Lora, then went out and lost his next fight to Casey Ramos.
Featured on the undercard but not on TV will be southpaw lightweight prospect Luis Ramos Jr (21-0, 9 KO). BoxRec has him listed as facing veteran Daniel Attah (26-9-1, 9 KO), but the press release says no opponent is set yet, so maybe Attah pulled out, or maybe he's the guy, I don't know. Ramos was last seen on the January 6 edition of ShoBox, winning a solid fight against Raymundo Beltran.
Also featured will be local favorite Antonio Escalante (26-4, 17 KO), who will be facing Francisco Camacho (7-0, 2 KO). At this point the 26-year-old Escalante is probably a busted prospect, but he's won a couple in a row against totally inferior opposition since having his lights turned out by Daniel Ponce De Leon and Alejandro Lopez. Escalante really has two problems, and they are awful problems in combination: His defense is lousy and he doesn't take punches all that well. We didn't know it at the time, but the high point of his career was definitely his 2010 Fight of the Year contender win over Miguel Roman.
Bad Left Hook will have live round-by-round coverage of the full Showtime broadcast on Saturday, including the SHO Extreme fights.