Elijah Garcia and Armando Resendiz produced the most impressive victories of their developing careers on the same “Showtime Championship Boxing” card March 4.
Five months later, they agreed to fight each other in an intriguing battle between ambitious, emerging, young middleweight contenders. BoxingScene.com has learned that Garcia (15-0, 12 KOs) and Resendiz (14-1, 10 KOs) will square off in a 160-pound bout on the Showtime Pay-Per-View portion of the Canelo Alvarez-Jermell Charlo undercard September 30 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
Garcia, 20, knocked out previously unbeaten Uruguayan contender Amilcar Vidal in the fourth round of their 10-round match March 4 at Toyota Arena in Ontario, California. Their Premier Boxing Champions fight was considered a significant step up in opposition for Garcia, a powerful southpaw who aspires to own a middleweight world title by the time he is 21.
In the following fight Showtime televised that night, Resendiz upset former IBF/IBO/WBA 154-pound champ Jarrett Hurd. Resendiz battered and bloodied the favored Hurd (24-3, 16 KOs) on his way to a 10th-round knockout caused in large part by a grotesque gash on Hurd’s lip.
Resendiz led on all three scorecards – 89-82, 87-84 and 87-84 – entering the 10th and final round against Hurd. His career-changing victory versus Hurd helped Resendiz atone for a surprising 10-round, unanimous-decision defeat to Marcos Hernandez (16-6-2, 3 KOs) in September 2021 at The Armory in Minneapolis.
Mexico’s Resendiz hasn’t fought since he stopped Hurd, who ended an almost 21-month layoff when they fought. Garcia, of Wittmann, Arizona, returned to the ring just seven weeks after he knocked out Vidal (17-1, 13 KOs).
He went the distance in that bout – a 10-round, unanimous-decision victory over Mexico’s Kevin Salgado (16-2-1, 11 KOs) on the Gervonta Davis-Ryan Garcia undercard April 22 at T-Mobile Arena. Garcia-Salgado was the opener of Showtime’s four-fight pay-per-view telecast that night.
As BoxingScene.com and other outlets previously reported, the Alvarez-Charlo undercard will also include a junior middleweight match in which left-handed contenders Jesus Ramos (20-0, 16 KOs), of Casa Grande, Arizona, and Erickson Lubin (25-2, 18 KOs), of Orlando, Florida, will square off.
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.