He then fought Jesse Brinkley and defeated him after seven rounds, earning a place to box against Peter Manfredo in the final.
[9] It was rumoured that Mora was to fight WBC and WBO middleweight title holder Jermain Taylor at some point during 2007.
With only 18 career bouts at the time, Mora also felt he lacked experience to challenge for a world title.
Mora made his return to the ring after 14 months against Elvin Ayala on October 16, 2007, at The Home Depot Center.
On January 11, 2008, Sergio Mora stopped Rito Ruvalcaba in the sixth round of their scheduled 10-round middleweight fight at the Casino Morongo.
He hurt Ruvalcaba with a combination, drove him to the ropes and landed another left hand, at which point the referee stopped the fight.
On June 7, 2008, Mora defeated Vernon Forrest via a 12-round majority decision to become the WBC super welterweight champion.
In the build-up to the fight, Forrest threatened to send Mora "out on a stretcher" and referred to him as the "pretender" (parodying "Contender").
Forrest took an early lead in what began as a tactical bout, working behind a left jab and landing right hands.
Mora started to force his way into the fight in the fourth round, throwing hard punches to Forrest's body and consistently outworking the defending champion.
[14] Mora had problems making weight for the rematch, having to lose two pounds after failing the initial weigh-in, and after the fight said that he did not expect the quick turnaround on the rematch clause and had needed more time to make the weight properly, resulting in his poor performance.
[17] On April 3, 2010, in his first fight in over eighteen months, Mora defeated Calvin Green by 7th-round TKO on the Bernard Hopkins-Roy Jones Jr. 2 undercard.
[18] Mora dominated a game Green, fighting with him primarily on the inside landing combinations against him with his quicker hands.
He hurt Green several times in the fight, and the ref had finally seen enough after an unanswered salvo of punches from Sergio in the 7th round.
Mora then took a stay-busy fight in November 2011 against Jose Flores, whom he defeated by corner stoppage before the eighth round began.
[30] The fight was however canceled, due to Taylor being arrested after an altercation where he threatened a family at the MLK Day parade in Little Rock.