By Daniel Leal

Brazilian prospect Patrick Teixeira is coming back after suffering the first defeat of his career, which came against the always dangerous Curtis Stevens last year.

In the first boxing event that was staged at the brand new T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Teixeira (26-1, 22 KO's) was given a showcase position as part of the HBO Pay-Per-View undercard to Canelo Alvarez's clash with Amir Khan.

At that time, the Brazilian fighter was rated at number #4 under the IBF, #5 by the WBO and 15# by the WBC in the light-middleweight rankings, but he moved up to the middleweight ranks to take a big step up in class against former world title challenger Stevens. Things did not go as planned, with Stevens stopping him in two rounds.

Since then, Teixeira has been out of action, training hard under the guidance of Ismael Salas, and waiting for the next opportunity to arise from Los Angeles based promoter, Golden Boy Promotions.

And that opportunity will happen later this month, on July 29th, when he'll meet WBA-NABA middleweight champ Andrew Hernandez (19-5-1, 9 KO's) at the Casino del Sol, in Tucson, Arizona.

The main event of the evening will feature United States Olympian Sadam Ali (24-1, 14 KO's) in a tough contest against Johan Perez (22-3-2, 15 KO's) - which also headline televised portion of Golden Boy's live broadcast on ESPN 2.

The upcoming fight is a make or break opportunity for the once highly regarded Brazilian hope. If Patrick wins in sensational fashion, he will reportedly receive another high-level bout in a similar scenario to the contest with Stevens. Teizeira has to prove  that he's worthy of all the hype that he received in his homeland. The once rising-star has to prove that he still got the power and technique to meet the high expectations that were showered upon him by his countrymen.