Marquez could get title shot against Kell Brook in 2015

By Boxing News - 01/27/2015 - Comments

marquez000000By Dan Ambrose: While former four division world champion Juan Manuel Marquez (56-7-1, 40 KOs) hasn’t fought in the past eight months, he could be getting a shot at facing IBF welterweight champion Kell Brook (33-0, 22 KOs) later on this year for Brook’s IBF title if the British fighter gets past his March 28th title defense against his #1 IBF mandatory challenger Jo Jo Dan at the Motorpoint Arena, in Sheffield, Yorkshire, United Kingdom.

Marquez’s co-promoter Fernando Beltran says Marquez wants the fight against Brook. It would give the 41-year-old Marquez a chance at winning a 5th division world title, and this is something that he badly wants before he retires.

Both Brook and his promoter Eddie Hearn have expressed interest in wanting to face Marquez, because they feel this would be a big fight in the UK if they could stage it there.

“Juan Manuel is in England, right now. He and I promote Daniel Estrada. That’s the main reason for his trip to England,” said Beltran via RingTV.com. “But he would love to fight Kell Brook, because he wants the welterweight title. So when he returns, we’ll talk.”

Marquez isn’t ranked in the top 15 by the International Boxing Federation at this time, but he is ranked #2 by the WBO. That obviously is a high enough ranking for Marquez to get the fight against Brook, even if he doesn’t fight again until they meet later in 2015.

The time out of the ring will give Marquez more time to rehab his injured knee that he hurt in his last fight against Mike Alvarado in May of 2014. The injury has been slow in healing, and it’s reportedly still giving him trouble.

For Marquez, this will be the third time he’s attempted to win one of the welterweight titles. He was beaten by Manny Pacquiao in a controversial 12 round decision in 2011 in a fight that many boxing fans had Marquez winning, including this writer.

Marquez fought former WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley in October of 2013 and lost a 12 round split decision. Bradley basically moved around the ring for 12 rounds and didn’t give Marquez much of a chance to land shots in a very boring fight from start to finish.

Marquez knocked Pacquiao out cold in their last fight together in 2012. Going into the fight, Marquez was fed up with what he felt was poor judging in his three previous fights with Pacquiao, all of which he felt he should have won. In the last fight, Marquez decided to take the judges out of the picture by knocking Pacquiao out, and that’s exactly what he did.

Estrada will be facing Kevin Mitchell on Saturday night at the O2 Arena in London, UK.



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