By Dan Ambrose: Nacho Beristain, the trainer for Juan Manuel Marquez (55-7-1, 40 KO’s), was on his side last night in feeling that he should have been given the decision against WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley (31-0, 12 KO’s) in their fight in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Marquez lost the fight by a 12 round split decision, but the fight could have very well gone the other way because Marquez landed the harder shots in every round of the fight.
Beristain said to the Los Angeles Times “Bradley’s a good fighter, and he’s very lucky. He’s the only undefeated fighter with two losses.”
I agree with Beristain. I watched the fight for a second time with the sound from HBO talking heads turned down, and I saw Marquez winning the fight by 2 rounds. I couldn’t give Bradley rounds where he was running around and just spoiling rather than actually fighting. Bradley should have lost to Manny Pacquiao last year in their fight, and I think Bradley should have lost last night.
Bradley ended up with a slight overall connect advantage of 168 to 153 for Marquez, but there was no comparison in terms of the power of their punches. Marquez was simply the harder puncher in the fight, and he was the one making the fight with his pressure. Bradley was backing away from him for 12 rounds, looking to avoid getting hit and trying to steal rounds in the last 10 seconds of every round.
Marquez probably needed a knockout to get the win because when you have a fighter that is just hitting and running the way that Bradley did last night, some judges like that kind of thing. The two that scored the fight for Bradley clearly saw that as proof that he was winning the rounds. When you have judges that score rounds for fighters that compete like that instead of mixing it up, it makes it difficult for the fighter that is pressing the action and trying to make the fight happen. That’s why Marquez should have spent his training camp in trying to work on his power instead of his speed, because he wasn’t going to beat Bradley at his own game in terms of speed.
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