Mike Alvarado born July 28, 1980, is a Mexican-American boxer in the Light Welterweight and Welterweight divisions. Alvarado is the IBF Latino Light Welterweight Champion. Alvarado was going to fight Paulie Malignaggi but he suffered an elbow injury and withdrew from the fight set for June 27, 2009.
He served a 5 month prison sentence and made a return to boxing with a 2nd round KO of Lenin Arroyo.[Alvarado was to fight on Latin fury 15 but was back in jail for parole violations, he had been on probation for traffic and driving offenses and another charge. Mike would then make a successful return to the ring by knocking out the veteran Joshua Burns.Up to this point in his boxing career, Alvarado had beaten fighters such as Carlos Molina, Michael Clark, Michel Rosales, César Bazán, Emmanuel Clottey, and Juaquin Gallardo.
Alvarado beat Ghana's Raymond Narh (25-1), to win the WBC Continental Americas Light Welterweight Championship, which he would later vacate just before his fight with Gabriel Martinez.This bout was on Showtime's televised portion of the Pacquiao vs. Mosley undercard.Alvarado's next victory was against Gabriel Martínez, to win IBF Latino Light Welterweight Championship. The bout took place on July 30, 2011 in Denver
Coming in as two undefeated fighters, Alvarado faced Brandon Rios at the Home Depot Center in Carson, California on October 13. Alvarado was ahead of the scorecards until the 6th round where in Rios hurt him with a crushing right. Rios was able to stop him in the 7th as referee Pat Russell stopped the bout at 1:57 of the round. The fight was voted the 2012 Fight of the Year by the Sports Illustrated.
A much anticipated rematch was held on March 30, 2013 at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, Nevada. Like the first fight, both came in with a lot of fireworks as they continued to go toe to toe until the final bell. Alvarado defeated Rios via unanimous decision with scores of 115-113, 115-113 and 114-113 to even up the scores with Rios. Top Rank promoter Bob Arum dismissed another rematch and suggested to let the two boxers face other fighters first
