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Mike Alvarado has confirmed via his Twitter account that an October 19 fight with Ruslan Provodnikov is a done deal from his end. If the fight is indeed official, it will be fought at 140 pounds, and will serve as the live fight paired with a replay of the previous weekend's Bradley-Marquez pay-per-view event.
The fight will be held at the First Bank Center in Denver, giving Alvarado home field advantage. Denver-based journalist Brandon Spano broke the news first on his Twitter account.
Alvarado (34-1, 23 KO) is coming off of a career-best win, beating Brandon Rios in a terrific rematch on March 30, while Provodnikov (22-2, 15 KO) took part in arguably the only better fight of 2013, his dramatic and brutal March 16 loss to Timothy Bradley at welterweight.
Whether or not this qualifies as a "big fight" is pretty irrelevant, since we know what we can expect, and we know why we'll all be tuning in. Alvarado vs Provodnikov promises great action, some jaw-dropping exchanges, and a high usage of the word "warrior" in the post-fight recaps around the boxing world. This has been rumored for weeks now, and luckily, it's the fight we'll be getting.
Who wins in October? Might Alvarado suffer a hometown letdown after such a big win, or is he just on another level from Provodnikov?