Ortiz recovering from two-hour surgery on broken jaw

Former welterweight titleholder Victor Ortiz is resting at Cedars Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles the morning after a two-hour Sunday night surgery to repair the broken jaw he suffered during Saturday night's Showtime-televised ninth-round knockout loss to Josesito Lopez at The Staples Center, his manager, Rolando Arellano, informed RingTV.com on Monday.

"The operation went great. The doctors went in there and they did their repairs. Now, it's a matter of healing and letting the surgery and the repair find its place and begin the healing process. When they do a surgery like that, they wanted to make sure that everything went well," said Arellano.

"They wanted to make sure that he is stable. So when Victor got out of surgery, he went to the intensive care unit for a couple of hours and they made sure that all of the post-surgery vitals and everything were stable and then he went back to his room and now he's in a stable and resting condition."

As part of the operation to stablize Ortiz's right jaw, Arellao said that the fighter's mouth has been wired shut and that both a metal plate and screws have been inserted.

"Victor's wired. He'll be wired for two weeks. They had to put in a plate and the screws in his jaw," said Arellano, speaking via cell phone from Ortiz's bedroom with the fighter nearby. "The wires will come off in two weeks, and then he can probably start running and strengthening his jaw muscles."

Arellano said that Ortiz (29-4-2, 22 knockouts) fought Lopez (29-4, 18 KOs) with the injury from "about the fifth round on."

"Basically, from the fifth round on, Victor fought with a broken jaw. Victor says that he knew that there was a problem because he couldn't keep his mouth shut. Every time he tried, it would just drop open," said Arellano.

"So during the fight, he had to push his jaw up and hold it against it so that he could continue fighting. He also tried to use his glove to protect it."

The loss to Lopez was considered an upset for Ortiz, foiling a planned shot at Mexican WBC junior middleweight beltholder Saul "Canelo" Alvarez (40-0-1, 29 KOs) on Showtime Pay Per View that was slated for Sept. 15 had he beaten Lopez.

But Arellano said that he believes that Ortiz would "absolutely" consider the rematch which was worked into the contract with Lopez.

In fact, Ortiz wrote down "exercise the rematch clause" on a piece of paper as Arellano spoke.

"Basically, I am going to make sure that he's okay. Once the medical doctor tells me that he's going to heal just fine, you're going to be okay, and your jaw's going to be even stronger than it was before," said Arellano, "then I will put people on notice immediately thereafter about our rematch clause, and I'll put people on notice. I will start giving people an idea about how long it will be before we can actually get back into camp."

Golden Boy CEO Richard Schaefer said that Showtime President Stephen Espinoza would welcome Lopez-Ortiz II.

"We do have a rematch option, and I'm sure that he would want to exercise that," said Schaefer. "And who wouldn't want to see another fight between those two guys? Who wouldn't want to see a rematch of the Fight of The Year candidate?"

On Tuesday evening at 10 p.m., Showtime will replay Lopez-Ortiz.

Click here for a glimpse of Lopez-Ortiz.

Photo by Tom Hogan Photos, Golden Boy Promotions

Lem Satterfield can be reached at lemuel.satterfield@gmail.com