Matchmaking is not rocket science. Put Arturo Gatti in with Micky Ward, as HBO did for the first time in 2002, and you know what you are going to get: the Fight of the Year.

In 2001, Ward beat Emmanuel Burton (who has since changed his last name to Augustus), on ESPN2 in that year's Fight of the Year. When Ward-Burton was originally scheduled on Friday Night Fights, I was overjoyed. It was just so obvious that we had a great fight on our hands. Ward and Burton had each demonstrated the chin, heart, stamina and style throughout his career such that all you have to do is put him in with someone like him to ensure a memorable war.

Last Friday night, Julian "Mr. K.O." Letterlough took on Richard "The Destroyer" Hall in a match-up of two excellent light heavyweight punchers. Letterlough made his reputation as an all-action 175-pounder on our air in brutal slugfests, first against Demetrius Jenkins in a great action fight he won by knockout, and later against Julio Gonzales in a great action fight he lost on points. The Gonzales fight featured a total of five knockdowns between the two fighters.

Hall made his way into the consciousness of the boxing world with his courageous stand against Roy Jones Jr. Though he was thoroughly dominated by Jones, Hall showed real toughness and heart in standing up to the then-light heavyweight champ's attack for 11 rounds. After the Jones fight, Hall made his way over to Germany where he lost a pair of hard-fought and somewhat controversial fights to Darius Michalczewski. In the wake of the Michalczewski fights it was apparent that Hall would at least be competitive with any non-Roy (which is to say, non-superhuman) 175-pounder in the world.

Going into last week's fight, it was clear that both Letterlough and Hall could really punch, and both were willing to mix it up. And so (surprise, surprise), The Destroyer and Mr. K.O. gave us a tremendous two-round war, in which The Destroyer had to rise from a devastating first-round knockdown to win by knockout in the very next round.

Matchmaking is not rocket science.

So it should not take an advanced degree to know that this Saturday night, we have something special in the main event. Julio Garcia, "The Cuban Lover" as he is known, is in there with J.C. Candelo, who is coming off a tremendous, albeit losing, effort against The Ring Magazine's top rated junior middleweight contender, Winky Wright.

The winner of Garcia-Candelo will be one of the hottest 154-pound contenders in the world, because he will have a claim that he won the 2003 Fight of the Year.

There have been some tremendous action fights so far in 2003. The two standouts that jump to mind are James Toney's masterful and dramatic action-packed win over the at-the-time undefeated Vasily Jirov for the top ranking at 190 pounds, and Gatti's win in the incredible rubbermatch of his series against Ward. The Toney-Jirov fight was contested on a higher skills level than Candelo-Garcia are capable of, and Gatti-Ward was a much higher profile fight than Candelo-Garcia.

But it says here that Candelo-Garcia on Saturday night will rival any fight this year, including the two aforementioned wars, for pure action.

Both Candelo and Garcia have demonstrated the ability to absorb punishment and keep fighting. Both are aggressive fighters who throw an extremely high volume of punches, and yet while both throw meaningful shots, neither is a one-punch knockout artist. If there is a knockout in this fight, it is likely to come after a long, grueling battle.

Even sans knockout, Candelo-Garcia should be non-stop punching from bell to bell. And nothing less than appointment viewing for hardcore boxing fans.

Max Kellerman is a studio analyst for ESPN2's "Friday Night Fights" and the host of the show "Around The Horn."