By Jake Donovan

Another day, another junior middleweight fight secured that doesn’t include Vanes Martirosyan.

The past calendar year hasn’t been very kind to the undefeated prospect-turned contender, who has remained inactive since June while calling out seemingly everyone in and around the junior middleweight division.

When plans were announced for Puerto Rican superstar Miguel Cotto to return to the ring on March 12, no opponent was immediately announced or even suggested. Martirosyan was hoping that public perception of Top Rank preferring to keep everything in-house would work in his favor and that he would land the assignment.

His last ring appearance coincided with the last time the viewing public has laid eyes on Cotto, when both fought in separate bouts on an HBO-televised doubleheader live from Yankee Stadium this past June. Cotto won a junior middleweight belt after stopping Yuri Foreman in nine rounds, while Martirosyan bested Joe Greene over ten rounds in a battle of unbeaten junior middleweights.

The hope coming out of that evening – at least from his perspective – was that his promoter would use the results from that card as means to push for a head-on collision.

It didn’t quite work out that way.

An opponent has since been named – or at least suggested and in the process of being finalized – but it’s a far cry from an undefeated contender in the prime of his career, the uniform Martirosyan proudly wears at the moment.

Instead, it’s badly faded former lineal welterweight champion Ricardo Mayorga who has been tabbed to help generate public interest – and sales – in what will serve as a pay-per-view event that will air live from the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Needless to say, Martirosyan isn’t particularly keen on the opponent choice for the three-division beltholder.

“The reason why Cotto's adviser picked Mayorga is because they want to fight someone they can beat,” Martirosyan surmises. “Mayorga is an old guy. I think people would love to see Cotto fight a young undefeated fighter who is hungry and will give his best rather than someone who got knocked out by a fighter Cotto has beaten already."

The last riddle is in reference to Mayorga having suffered a last-second knockout at the hands of equally faded Shane Mosley, who in fact was coming off of a 12-round decision loss to Cotto 10 months prior.

Martirosyan’s point is that a win over Mayorga does nothing for Cotto, other than mark time while Top Rank figures out in which direction to head at this stage of the Puerto Rican’s career.

The loss to Mosley was Mayorga’s last ring appearance for more than two years, a period that saw the controversial Nicaraguan brawler pull out of one high profile fight and also attempted to make a run at a career in mixed martial arts.

Both events were met with threats of litigation, before he returned to the ring in mid-December. The ring rust was evident early on before Mayorga picked up steam and eventually stopped fringe contender Michael Walker in the ninth-round of the over-the-limit middleweight bout.

It served as his first win in more than three years, but was enough to convince promoter Bob Arum to pick up the phone and dial up longtime business rival Don King, who – for better or for worse – remains Mayorga’s promoter.

As is often the case with any pay-per-view event these days, the selection of Mayorga is based far more on the hopes of milking a few extra sales from the general public than it is about selling a competitive fight, although the consensus belief is that it will be a shootout for as long as it lasts.

All that Martirosyan hopes for is a shot at the winner – more specifically, a fight with Cotto as he believes the outcome to be a foregone conclusion.

"Everyone knows Mayorga isn't the same fighter anymore but I wish both of them the best of luck. I'm sure Cotto will knock him out.  I hope after that he steps up and fights a young fighter. I will fight Cotto for free.  That's how bad I wanted to fight him but whatever Top Rank and my team decide they want to do I'm all for it."

While waiting for that opportunity, he hopes for another that would actually allow him to bring more to the table for a fight with Cotto or any other top fighter in or around his weight class.

“Since Don King has the IBF champ (Cornelius ‘K9’ Bundrage), I should fight him and make it a junior middleweight doubleheader.”

Jake Donovan is the Managing Editor of Boxingscene.com. Follow Jake on Twitter at twitter.com/JakeNDaBox or submit questions/comments to JakeNDaBox@gmail.com .