Keith Thurman wants to unify the 147lb titles after Collazo fight

By Boxing News - 06/29/2015 - Comments

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By Dan Ambrose: WBA World welterweight champion Keith Thurman (25-0, 21 KOs) has set a goal for himself to unify the titles at 147 pounds in the near future. Unfortunately for Thurman, he’s turned down his first opportunity to do just that by choosing to not fight #8 WBA Errol Spence (17-0, 14 KOs) for one or more of the welterweight titles on September 12th.

Thurman says he doesn’t think Spence has proven himself yet, but what’s troubling about that is Thurman is seemingly turning his back on unifying the titles by opting not to fight the hard hitting Spence, who many boxing fans see as the future dominant force at welterweight.

Thurman will be taking a soft voluntary defense against 2nd tier fighter Luis Collazo (33-6, 19 KOs) on July 11th next month at the USF Sun Dome in Tampa, Florida. It’s not a great fight given the ambition that the 26-year-old Thurman has. He called himself “One Time,” but he hasn’t knocked anyone out since stopping a past his prime former lightweight Julio Diaz last year in April.

thurman345(Photo credit: Premier Boxing Champions). If Thurman continues to have problems scoring knockouts, he’s going to have to change his nickname to something else more fitting.

It’s best not to have something that relates to a knockout if you’re not able to score knockouts against 1st tier opposition. Thurman got virtually all of his knockouts against weaker opposition, and he’s not been able to KO the top tier guys Robert Guerrero and Leonard Bundu that he recently fought.

“I am an evolutionary boxer,” Thurman said. “I change and grow with every camp, every fight, I am here to retain my title and become the undisputed, true welterweight champ.”

Maybe Thurman is waiting for the right opponent for him to try and unify the titles against. The problem with that is even if a vulnerable guy comes along to fight for the vacated welterweight titles, once Mayweather gives them up, it’s not like Thurman will get a chance to fight for those belts. It’ll be two top contenders who will fight for the titles, and once they win the belts, they’re not likely to try and unify the titles. That’s not what we’ve seen from fighters in the last 10 years.

Most of the time when a fighter captures a world title belt, they milk the title against the weakest opposition possible and don’t bother fighting difficult unification bouts. That’s why it doesn’t make sense for Thurman to turn down the Spence fight for one of the titles that Mayweather will be giving up, because it might be Thurman’s only chance of unifying a title. I don’t see anyone volunteering to fight Thurman.

In looking at how heavy Thurman is, you have to wonder how much longer he’ll be able to make weight for the welterweight division. He looks more like a junior middleweight than a welterweight, and I can’t imagine him being able to make weight for the 147lb division for too much longer.

Thurman gets big in between fights, and he looks like he should be fighting at 154 right now instead of at 147. Thurman’s size gives him an advantage over other welterweights, but once he’s forced to move up in weight, it’ll be interesting to see how he does against guys his own weight at junior middleweight. He might find it difficult to mix it up with the likes of Saul “Canelo” Alvarez or Gennady Golovkin, who would likely jump at the chance to fight Thurman at 154 if he were game, which I seriously doubt.

I don’t think Thurman would ever agree to a fight against Golovkin because he’s already having problems dealing with punches from welterweights like Jesus Soto Karass, Robert Guerrero and Diego Chaves.



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