Rubio in stay busy fight against Baldomir on Saturday

By Boxing News - 09/03/2012 - Comments

Image: Rubio in stay busy fight against Baldomir on SaturdayBy Jason Kim: Former world title challenger Marco Antonio Rubio (54-6-1, 47 KO’s) will be facing 41-year-old journeyman and former WBC welterweight champion Carlos Baldomir (49-14-6, 15 KO’s) on Saturday night in a fight for the vacant World Boxing Federation super middleweight title at the Gimnasio Miguel Aleman Valdez, in Celaya, Guanajuato, Mexico.

Rubio, #4 WBO, #6 WBC, is working his way back up towards another title shot after failing in his fight against WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. last February in a 12 round decision loss. Rubio was never hurt against Chavez Jr. and fought well but didn’t have the size to compete with the 180 pounder. The 6’0″ height of Chavez Jr wasn’t the problem for the 5’10” Rubio.

It was the weight. Rubio came into fight at 165 lbs, and had to deal with Chavez Jr,, who had a 15 pound weight advantage. Rubio then spent most of the fight pinned to the ropes either blocking or taking shots from Chavez Jr, while periodically firing back. Rubio did a lot better against Chavez Jr. than he did in losing to WBC/WBO middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik in a 9th round stoppage loss in February 2009. In his last fight, Rubio rebounded from his loss to Chavez Jr. to defeat Jorge Cota by a 7th round TKO win last June.

Baldomir is still mostly winning but he’s not beating anyone of real quality anymore like he used to. It’s all 2nd tier wins nowadays and he’s become kind of an old name to be used by fighters like Saul Alvarez and now Rubio to get a well known opponents. It’s surprising that Baldomir is still fighting because his once good career has been on the decline for the past six years since losing his WBC welterweight title to Floyd Mayweather Jr. in November 2006. Baldomir pulled off a big upset in beating then WBC welterweight champion Zab Judah in January 2006 in a 12 round decision win. He also beat Arturo Gatti in his next fight, stopping him in the 9th round.

Rubio should be able to beat Baldomir on Saturday without any slip ups, as long as Baldomir doesn’t find his lost youth and fight over his head. It’s still hard to imagine seeing the 5’7″ Baldomir fighting at super middleweight. That just seems like a wrong weight class for someone as small as Baldomir, although it’s not much better for the 5’10” Rubio either, because he’s considered small for middleweight.



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