By Cliff Rold

There could be a feeling watching Jorge Linares defeat Anthony Crolla for the WBA lightweight title with one of his better career wins that it had finally all come together.

The fighter, the promise, many believed they saw when Linares (41-3, 27 KO) burst from the pack with a win over Oscar Larios a decade ago, seemed finally to have put it all together. He boxed beautifully, fought fiercely, and stayed off the floor.

He often has done the first two in the years since Larios. He couldn’t always do the last of them. It’s hard to believe it’s been a decade. Linares at 31 is still young and despite his long tenure still feels young. What we’ve seen in his current winning streak, ten straight since a second round loss to Sergio Thompson in 2012, is also a maturing and toughening of Linares.

In May 2015, he didn’t fall apart when Kevin Mitchell dropped him in the fifth round. He kept it together, cut Mitchell to pieces, and defeated the tough UK product via stoppage. That he did it on the road, where it can be easy to lose one’s composure, was more evidence of a fighter who has gotten better over time.

Being on the road is nothing new for Linares. The Venezuelan, who made much of his career in Japan, has never really had a home base. Two of his last three, Mitchell and Crolla (31-5-3, 13 KO), were in the UK. The rematch with Crolla this Saturday (Showtime, 6 PM EST/3 PM PST) will be as well. In total, Linares has fought in eight different countries in his career.

Being on the road isn’t an issue. Crolla might be.

If Linares is the fighter finally achieving the way it was expected of him long ago, Crolla has played the part of overachiever well. He was an unlikely titlist and one who did it the hard way, suffering a questionable draw to Darleys Perez before knocking him out for the strap in November 2015. Many thought he’d have his hands full with Ismael Barroso in his first defense and early on he did.

He still won, overcoming a cut to stop Barroso with a body shot in the seventh.

His luck ran out against Linares but it wasn’t through lack of effort. The judges even seemed sympathetic, two of them giving Linares closer scores than he appeared to earn. Hometown advantages have their advantages.

And so as we head into the rematch this weekend, we find a fight very similar to the first one in terms of the story it tells. A wrinkle this time is Linares has come through the fire once already and come out with Crolla’s title. Now, he simply has to keep it.

Linares is still the fighter who pushes back on past disappointments, and questions of when the next will arrive, with each picturesque jab or combination. Crolla is still the over achiever making the most of his talent against men who seem a cut above him on paper.

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The first time it made for a hell of a fight. There is no reason to think it won’t again.

Enter another wrinkle.

For Linares, the stakes may be higher this time. A loss to Crolla the first time would have been a big setback but the win opened up the possibilities for some of the best paying options of his career. In prizefighting, knowing the big prize by way of purse size is almost at hand elevates the drama.

There has been talk of unification chances for Linares at lightweight. For US fans, that talk would center around Mikey Garcia. Garcia looked like a monster in winning the WBC crown from Dejan Zlaticanin earlier this year and a Linares-Garcia clash, even with some promotional impediments, is one that should excite fight fans.

Can Linares avoid the power of Garcia? Is Garcia, a fighter who can match his skill, far more than a power threat? Can Garcia be the canvas where Linares erases, once and for all, the specter of the past and firmly rewrites his fistic narrative?

Those are cool questions. They won’t get asked if he doesn’t win this weekend. In front of what is sure to be another rabid Crolla crowd, Linares may have to be even better this time than he was the first. The heights he reached last time around may now be a bar needing to be cleared. If Crolla can make it closer, the chances are there to swing the two rounds he would have needed on the cards last time to escape with his title.

Put it all together and we have all the ingredients for yet another memorable weekend of boxing in 2017. Hot on the heels of a fight of the year contender in Gonzalez-Sor Rungvisai, a tense battle between Gennady Golovkin and Daniel Jacobs, and a (relative to boxing) massive television audience for Keith Thurman-Danny Garcia, Linares-Crolla II is another fight that can keep the momentum going.

It makes for a most intriguing rematch this Saturday.      

    

Cliff Rold is the Managing Editor of BoxingScene, a founding member of the Transnational Boxing Rankings Board, and a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America.  He can be reached at roldboxing@hotmail.com