By Edward Chaykovsky

Mickey “The Spirit” Bey (20-1-1, 10 KOs) says he is mentally and physically prepared for his upcoming fight with IBF lightweight champion Miguel “Títere” Vazquez (34-3, 13 KOs), who won his last thirteen contests. Their fight takes place on Showtime Pay-Per-View undercard to the Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Marcos Maidana rematch, which takes place on Saturday night at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.

A year ago, Bey suffered his first career defeat when he was knocked out in the tenth and final round of his match with John Molina. At the time of the stoppage, Bey was well ahead on all three official scorecards. Bey recovered, winning two fights since suffering that defeat.

”Vazquez is a legit champion with several title defenses. I give full credit to him. He’s rated number one at lightweight. That’s what makes it better for me. A lot of people complain that guys are fighting for vacant titles or cherry-picking. I just love the biggest challenges and coming out on top and that is what I’m gonna do on Sept. 13. We’re both stepping up and I’m the underdog," Bey said.

“I prefer this. I don’t need the easy route. I’m finally where I’d be if I hadn’t had all the inactivity. So I’m gonna kill all the birds with one stone. People don’t know how hungry or determined I am. You never know who’s gonna come out on top in this game, you never know for sure what the guy has inside, and you never know what a fighter’s gonna bring that night. So you’ve got to be ready.

According to Bey, he learned a big lesson from the loss to Molina and plans to showcase his talents before the biggest audience of his career.

“Camp was excellent. I learned from the Molina fight. I’d won every round but the only thing I shouldn’t have done was showboated at the very end. Nobody beat Molina like I beat him, not even Matthysse. Matthysse had problems with him," Bey said. “So I learned the hard way that you don’t play around until after the bell rings and the fight is over.’’