By Dan Ambrose: WBC middleweight champion Sergio Martinez (51-2-2, 28 KO’s) says the New York State Athletic Commission are going to let him wear his knee brace for his fight on Saturday night against Miguel Cotto (38-4, 31 KO’s) after all. It was thought that Martinez wasn’t going to be able to wear the brace for the fight, but it looks like Martinez’s management smoothed it over with the Commission. Sergio says he has doctor’s orders to wear the knee brace to protect his surgically repaired right knee.
Martinez isn’t sure if it was someone from Cotto’s team that may have dropped a dime about his knee brace by contacting the Commission about it, but whatever the case he says he’s going to take it out on Cotto’s hide on Saturday night by giving him a beating in front of his own fans at Madison Square Garden in New York.
“There are no issues with the sheath I will be using for my knee on fight night,” said Martinez. “Once the commission saw what it actually was I was using, they were completely okay with it. It was very hard for me to come back from this [the knee and shoulder injury], but I have an excellent team behind me, and more than that I have my ego and that is what drove me to get back to where I was before the injuries occurred. I don’t know who brought up the issue about the sheath I am wearing on my knee. Whether it was the commission or Cotto’s team directly I am not sure. The only one who will pay for it though is Miguel Cotto on June 7th.”
This obviously can’t be good news for Team Cotto because Martinez not being allowed to wear the knee brace on his bad knee was perhaps the only real chance that Cotto had to win the fight on Saturday. With the knee brace on, Martinez’s knee is likely almost 100% because he can put more weight on it than he would if there wasn’t a knee brace.
This could be bad for Cotto’s team unless the New York Commission reverses their decision about letting Martinez wear the knee brace. That’s not likely to happen unless someone makes an appeal to the Commission to make an argument that Martinez’s knee brace is performance enhancing.
“I feel great, and you will see that come Saturday night. I am totally 100% healthy. My doctor told me that I only need to wear it as a precaution, so I am following my doctor’s orders,” Martinez added.
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