By Gary Purfield
Saturday night, hard-hitting lightweight John Molina (23-1, 19 KO) ignores the dangers of a tune-up when he meets Miguel Angel Munguia (25-23-1, 21 KO) in a ten round bout from the Sportsman Lodge in Studio City, CA. Assuming Molina wins, he has a date set with WBC Lightweight title holder Antonio Demarco (27-2-1, 20 KO) at the Oracle Arena in Oakland, CA on September 8 on the HBO televised undercard of Chad Dawson-Andre Ward.
Molina got attention early on as a power punching prospect, scoring knockouts on Showtime televised events. Molina won his first eighteen bouts with fourteen knockouts. In that time, he scored knockouts of Efren Hinojosa, Frankie Archuleta, and Joshua Allotey. Molina suffered his first loss when he was out boxed by Martin Honorio in 2009. Molina later reported that he had the flu the week of the televised fight and considered not going through with the bout.
Molina bounced back with two wins against lesser opposition before stepping up to take on fellow prospect fast punching and fast talking Hank Lundy on EPSN Friday Night Fights. Molina found himself being out boxed by Lundy, but kept looking to change the tide with his power. His aggression paid off as he hurt and stopped Lundy in the eleventh round.
Since then, Molina has knockout wins over Alejandro Rodriguez and Robert Frankel, but has not fought since June of 2011. So Molina will take the ever dangerous tune up bout before getting his first world title opportunity against Demarco.
Looking to play spoiler will be Munguia, who has a poor record, but his twenty one knockouts in twenty one wins suggest he has at least a puncher’s chance. Munguia has lost the few bouts he has had against name competition, including knockout losses to Daniel Jimenez and Richard Abril.
The Molina-Munguia bout is on the Telefutura undercard of the Rico Ramos-Efrain Esquivias main event.
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