By Ryan Burton

On February 17th, former champion Brandon Rios will return to the ring against Danny Garcia, who held titles at junior welterweight and welterweight.  The fight will headline a Showtime Championship Boxing card from the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas, Nevada. 

BoxingScene.com recently caught up with Rios and one of the topics discussed was his opinion on potential high level fights that may come to fruition in 2018.

One of those fights is the rematch Mexican superstar Canelo Alvarez and IBF, WBA, WBC, IBO middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin rematch - which is targeted for May 5th of next year. 

The first time around, back in September at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, the contest ended in a controversial twelve round draw. It was only the second time that Golovkin had gone the distance in his last 25 fights.

Leading into the fight, there were questions on whether or not Canelo would be able to take the power punches of Golovkin. The critics who believed he couldn't, Canelo proved them wrong when he handled several flush shots and never appeared to be hurt or in trouble.

Rios believes the contest will be different the second time around with Canelo being much more confident after going twelve rounds with GGG in the first meeting.

"It is going to be a good fight again. Of course I will go for Canelo. I think Canelo is going to beat him but it is a tough fight for both fighters. Was it really tough for Canelo? Yes. Was it as tough for Canelo as when he fought Mayweather? I don't think so. I think Mayweather was the way better fighter and more skillful than Triple G," Rios told BoxingScene.com. 

"Now he knows he can take [Golovkin's] power. It is a different story because they know they can take each other's punches now,."

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