Sergio Martinez won’t be fighting until 2014, says Dibella

By Boxing News - 07/01/2013 - Comments

martinez1By Allan Fox: If you were hoping to see WBC middleweight champion Sergio Martinez (51-2-2, 28 KO’s) step up to the plate and face the dangerous IBO/WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin (27-0, 24 KO’s) in a unification match this year you can forget it because Sergio’s promoter Lou Dibella is saying that he’ll be out of action the remainder of the 2013 healing from his injuries sustained in his hard-fought 12 round unanimous decision win over Martin Murray last April in Argentina.

Martinez will hopefully be fighting in early 2014, but not against Golovkin.

Dibella said to fightnews “Right now, his [Sergio] concentration is on healing and rehabilitation and he will not fight until sometime in the first half of 2014.”

If a Golovkin-Martinez fight does take place next year, then it’ll have to be in the second half of the year. However, I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for Dibella to make that fight. If he doesn’t ignore it altogether, it’s very possible Martinez could wind up with new injuries when he fights next in early 2014, and those injuries would make it difficult for Sergio to fight Golovkin in the 2nd half of the year.

Martinez will be turning 39-years-old in February, and he’s really starting to show his age since his win over Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. last year in September. Martinez tore up a knee and broke a hand in that fight. There’s talk that Martinez didn’t properly rehab his injured knee and that was one of the reasons why he struggled to beat Martin Murray last April.

Never the less, Martinez broke his left hand in the Murray fight and he tweaked his previously injured knee as well. Martinez is at the age where it’s difficult to fight without suffering some kind of injury. The problem is the injuries are keeping him out of action, and you can expect an injury that will keep him out of the ring after his next fight.

It’s likely that Dibella will choose to match Martinez up against other fighters rather than putting him in with Golovkin any time soon. If that was the biggest money fight and the most winnable option for Martinez, Dibella would probably make that fight in a second, but it’s not.

Martinez can make more money fighting the likes of Chavez Jr. and have a better shot at winning the fight than he would against Golovkin.



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