by Steve Kim

Lucas Matthysse will make his return to the ring this Saturday night at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas as he faces Emmanuel Taylor as a part of the HBO pay-per-view card that features the Mexican grudge match between Saul "Canelo" Alvarez and Julio Cesar Chavez Jr.

The last time the boxing public saw Matthysse was in October of 2015, when the boxer was getting stopped in ten rounds by Viktor Postol for the vacant WBC super lightweight title.

During that fight, Matthysse suffered an eye injury and that ailment kept him out of the ring in 2016.

For this bout, Matthysse is under the guidance of trainer Joel Diaz, who says 'the Machine' can still make a title run.

But he points out - "Not at 147, at 140. He's walking around at 153, right now," Diaz said last week at a media workout that was organized by Golden Boy Promotions, which is staging this card.

"At this point of his career ,coming back the (Taylor) fight is set at '47 but if it were my decision I'd bring him down to '40. Why? Because he's walking around at '53 now. He's not at 160 or 162 - he's walking around at '53 and he's been at '53 since he got here like three, four weeks ago. Which means he shouldn't have a problem. But they have a different mentality and I don't want to break it, right now," said Diaz.

For much of his career Matthysse (37-4, 34 KO's) has campaigned at 140, having battled the likes of Zab Judah, Devon Alexander, Lamont Peterson, Humberto Soto, John Molina, Danny Garcia and Ruslan Provodnikov in this weight class.

"When he came to me the fight was set at '47 and I want to leave it as is,' 'continued Diaz. "But if it were my preference from the beginning I would've brought him down to '40. Thirteen pounds is not a big deal."

Steve Kim is the news editor for BoxingScene.com.