By Scott Gilfoid: WBA welterweight champion Keith Thurman (24-0, 21 KOs) wants to put his WBA and unbeaten record on the line in a unification match against IBF welterweight champion Kell Brook (33-0, 22 KOs) in a battle of the unbeaten in the near future if the fight can get made.
Thurman could really increase his stature if he could add Brook’s scalp to his resume along with his IBF 147 pound title. A win over Brook would go a long ways towards getting Thurman the bigger fights he wants against the likes of Floyd Mayweather Jr and Manny Pacquiao.
To be sure, Thurman might need to add Khan’s pelt to his resume as well before he could get the huge fights, but he’d be going in the right direction in knocking those guys off one after another.
“I would love to [go over to the UK and fight Kell Brook],” Thurman said via skysports.com. ”As long as Kell is a champion and I am a champion, it is definitely a fight that I am willing to make. That could possibly be made,” Thurman said.
Thurman has a tough fight this Saturday night on March 7th against former two division world champion Robert “The Ghost” Guerrero (32-2-1, 18 KOs) at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada. That’s a fight that could literally go either way. I mean, Thurman has the speed, youth and power advantage in the fight, but then again he’s never fought anyone as good as Guerrero before and he’s never faced anyone that can put the pressure on like him.
Thurman can definitely win the fight, but if Guerrero is able to trap him into a 12 round war then anything is possible in this fight. Thurman doesn’t fight wars. He’s more of a hit and move type of fighter. If Guerrero can cut off his avenue of retreat over and over again, we’ll see what Thurman can do in an actual two-way war.
Brook has his own fight that he needs to get past later this month against #1 IBF Jo Jo Dan (34-2, 18 KOs) on March 28th at the Motorpoint Arena, Sheffield, Yorkshire, United Kingdom. This is a far easier task for Brook than Thurman’s fight against Guerrero.
Jo Jo Dan is someone with an inflated ranking in my view, and I don’t see him as having the talent to rate the ranking that the International Boxing Federation has given him. Dan has twice been beaten by Selcuk Aydin in the past, which kind of gives you a clear picture about the kind of talent that Dan has. If Brook can’t stomp Dan without clinching him all night like he did against Shawn Porter, then he needs to forget all about fighting Thurman.
Thurman isn’t the one who makes his fights, however, so it’s unclear if this is something that his adviser Al Haymon would be interested in doing. The same with Brook. His promoter is Eddie Hearn, and he seems dialed into trying to make a fight between Brook and Amir Khan for the summer.
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