Juan Manuel Marquez to make retirement decision in 2015

By Chris Williams: Juan Manuel Marquez (56-7-1, 40 KOs) says he’ll be making a decision about his boxing career in early 2015, whether to continue or retire. Marquez hasn’t fought since last May when he defeated Mike Alvarado by a 12 round unanimous decision.

That’s going to be the only fight for the 41-year-old Marquez in 2014 unfortunately. Marquez also fought once in 2013 when he was beaten by former WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley by a 12 round split decision.

Manny Pacquiao’s promoter Bob Arum of Top Rank would like nothing more than to match Marquez up with Pacquiao for a fifth time, because Marquez is one of the few fighters in the sport of boxing right now that would guarantee Pacquiao over 1 million pay-per-view buys. But for Arum to get Marquez, he’s going to need to give him a decent purse split of say 50-50 to get him to sign on the dotted line, because it’s doubtful that Marquez is going to agree to a purse split of 76/24.

That number is going to need to be bumped up quite a bit to get Marquez to agree to the fight, because he knows what he brings to the table in terms of PPV buys from his Mexican fans.

“I’m starting to train to see how I feel physically, I think I’ll make a decision later this year,” said El Dinamita via Radioplay.com.mx. “Making a decision is difficult for us because athletes miss the exercise, the applause; so I want to make a decision in these two months or three, then do not fall within the race, if I cannot continue they are going to do know.”

The options for Marquez really aren’t good if he chooses to continue fighting. Unless Marquez can fight someone like IBF welterweight champion Kell Brook, he’s probably looking at fights against guys like Bradley, Ruslan Provodnikov, Chris Algieri or Brandon Rios.

Those fights aren’t worth much for Marquez because there’s no upside in fighting them. Bradley, Rios and Provodnikov no longer have world titles in their possessions. Algieri is the WBO light welterweight belt holder, but Marquez has already won a world title in that weight class.