The decision to face Blair Cobbs was a no-brainer for Alexis Rocha.

So much, that it’s his second time accepting such an opportunity.

“To be honest, the fight was offered to him for my last fight,” Rocha informed BoxingScene.com. “It is what it is. We were ready to fight him last time. It was offered it to him, but he didn't take it so we fought Jeovanis Barraza.”

Rocha (18-1, 12KOs) went on to stop Barraza in the ninth round of their welterweight fight last November 13 at Honda Center in Anaheim, California. The win was the second straight for Rocha since his lone career defeat, a twelve-round decision to Rashidi Ellis in October 2020.

The hope was to have matched Santa Ana’s Rocha with Cobbs (15-0-1, 10KOs)—a Las Vegas-based welterweight who trains at Freddie Roach’s Wild Card Gym in Hollywood—on that show, only for the deal to fall through for reasons unknown to Rocha. That changed for the better during the most recent round of negotiations leading to their landing as the scheduled ten-round makeshift main event for Saturday’s DAZN show from USC Galen Center in Los Angeles.

Cobbs claimed he accepted the fight on three weeks’ notice as part of his mantra in taking on anyone, anyplace and anytime. His opponent has a different recollection of how it went down and what really led to this fight coming to fruition

“For the last fight, they kept mentioning Blair Cobbs, that he wasn’t fighting me,” insisted Rocha. “His team must’ve heard that or saw that, so they made a point of accepting this fight.

“The fight was presented again, we said yes right away and then they said yes.”

Rocha-Cobbs was advanced to main event after Vergil Ortiz (18-0, 18KOs) was pulled from the show after being hospitalized earlier in the week.

Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox