By Dan Ambrose: An ugly reality about the September 15th fight between WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (46-0-1, 32 KO’s) and Sergio Martinez (49-2-2, 28 KO’s) is that Martinez may need to spar with exclusively 175 pound light heavyweights in order to get ready for the Chavez Jr. bout.

This isn’t like fighting a normal sized middleweight. Chavez Jr. likes to bloat up with water weight after he makes the 160 pound middleweight limit for each fight, and he often gets right up to 180 lbs nowadays, which means that he’s effectively a cruiserweight since the light heavyweight division ends at 175. Martinez isn’t going to be able to train well if he spars with middleweights, because it’s not going to get him prepared for the huge size that Chavez Jr. will likely be coming into the fight.

There’s always a danger for a fighter to be sparring with one or two divisions larger than you are, because the power and size differences. However, Martinez doesn’t have any choice in the matter. As long as boxing isn’t going to install rehydration weight limits for the day of the fight you’re going to see guys like Chavez Jr. who are effectively light heavyweights who melt down to middleweight in order to find success.

If they had the rehydration limits then you wouldn’t see that anymore. It would keep fighters from trying to stray into the divisions below them to get an advantage. Of course, we’d still probably see a certain of fighters doing it anyway by rehydrating a little and then waiting until the second weigh-in on the day of the fight to finish rehydrating, but that’s why I think they should have a second weigh-in an hour before the fight so that you don’t have fighters still trying to fight out of their weight class.

Chavez Jr. is going to have to take all that water weight off and put back on in 24 hours, and even though he seems to have a weird ability to do this without being weakened in the process, I still think Martinez is going to dominate this fight with his speed and power no matter how big Chavez Jr. comes in for the fight. If Chavez Jr. comes in at 190, Martinez will still be the quicker fighter and will have the better power. As long he doesn’t stupidly rest against the ropes to make it easy for Chavez Jr., Martinez should win this fight with ease.