The fighter at the top of his list is WBC lightweight champion Mikey Garcia, who put some hurt on Adrien Broner last week?
Tonight at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles, California, in a fight televised live on ESPN, WBO super featherweight champion Vasyl ?Hi-Tech? Lomachenko (8-1, 6 KOs), the sensational southpaw from Oxnard, California, by way of Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi, Ukraine, will defend his title against Miguel ?The Scorpion? Marriaga (25-2, 21 KOs), the former WBO/NABO featherweight champion from Cartagena, Colombia.
Lomachenko is all that he?s cracked up to be. An two-time Olympic gold medalist, a two-division champion after only nine fights, he?s nothing short of a once-in-a-lifetime fighter. A defensive wizard, he can box with the best but also likes to fight.
With boxing experiencing a resurgence, ?High-Tech? is one of several very special fighters breathing life back into the sport.
The same cannot be said about Miguel Marriaga. As befits someone with his ring moniker, his punches can sting. But his previous attempts at winning a world title, against Nicholas Walters in 2015 and Oscar Valdez this year, both ended in defeat.
Marriga is a 16:1 underdog coming in, but he?s as ready for Lomachenko as he?ll ever be.
?We talked with the team and we decided to take the fight,? said Marriaga in LA. ?When they called me, I was already training in Colombia, so I was in shape. That?s why we decided to take the fight.?
No one wanted to see Loma fight Marriaga. The Colombian got lucky. He may have won the lottery. Fortune is his if he can beat Lomachenko.
Lomachenko has bigger fish to fry. There are bigger bugs than ?The Scorpion? to crush.
?I like it when fighters overlook me,? said Marriaga. ?I think that he?s overlooking me a little because he?s talking about fighting other fighters, other champions.
?I like it when they?re confident, so that I can surprise them in the fight.?
It will be a surprise should Marriaga pevail over someone the caliber of Lomachenko.
?I really think he?s a great fighter,? added Marriaga. ?He?s one of the best in boxing right now. But I also know that I?m one of the best and that?s why I think there?s gonna be a surprise in this fight.?
During a recent teleconference call, Lomachenko said he wanted to fight others than the man from Cartagena.
?The biggest thing for me is I want to fight top, top fighters in the weight class that I am now fighting in,? he said. ?That is my biggest goal. Then maybe it is different weight classes. I want to be in the history book of boxing?I want my name to be mentioned when people talk about the history of boxing. Most important for me is to fight the best?where the fight means something?fans want it?people want to see it.?
The fighter at the top of his list is WBC lightweight champion Mikey Garcia, who put some hurt on Adrien Broner last week.
?His trainer Robert Garcia mentioned that Mikey is a fighter A-Class,? Lomachenko said. ?I hadn?t seen anything during that bout that showed me he was a Class-A outstanding fighter. Yes, he won the fight. Yes, he did everything to win the fight, what he needed to be, but I haven?t seen anything outstanding and I haven?t seen him being a A-Class fighter.?
Another man ?High-Tech? wants to fight is Orlando Salido, who handed him his only loss.
?I would like to fight Salido but probably within a one-year period,? he said. ?If it is longer than that I am not going to be interested in fighting him because that bout wouldn?t mean anything. But in general I would like to get back in the ring with him to see how much better I can be in the second bout.
