Brook-Rios negotiations stuck on rematch clause language

By Boxing News - 07/04/2015 - Comments

brook55666By Scott Gilfoid: The negotiations have slowed for the fight between IBF welterweight champion Kell Brook (35-0, 24 KOs) and Brandon Rios (33-2, 24 KOs) due to the rematch clause the 29-year-old Brook wants in the contract. The planned date for the Brook-Rios fight is on September 12th at the O2 Arena in London, UK.

The undercard is expected to have unbeaten #2 WBC heavyweight Anthony Joshua facing Gary Cornish. It’s a nice mismatch for this pay-per-view card on Sky Box Office. I’m not sure that I would want to pay to see Brook-Rios and Joshua-Cornish, because I see those are free television type fights rather than something I would ever want to pay for.

If Brook ever faced someone that was actually good like Keith Thurman, Manny Pacquiao or Floyd Mayweather, then I would be interested in paying to see it. Brook vs. Rios is not a great fight, but sadly it’s a huge step up for Brook from the guys Hearn has been matching him against.

It would be a real disappointment if the Brook vs. Rios fight doesn’t get made because of a rematch clause holding it back. This was supposed to be Brook’s step up the top tier opposition after his many fights against lower level fodder for the past 11 years.

Rios isn’t even a great fighter, but he’s clearly much better than the guys that Hearn has been feeding Brook recently in matching him against Jo Jo Dan, Alvaro Morales, Vyacheslav Senchenko and Frankie Gavin. Those are the type of opposition you face when you’re more of a fringe contender rather than a champion.

“They are close but still haggling over some language, particularly on a rematch clause for Brook,” Dan Rafael said in his chat at ESPN.com.

The question I have is why does Brook need a rematch clause for the Rios fight? Is he not confident that he’ll beat Rios? It doesn’t make any sense at all to me. I mean, you pick out Rios to fight rather than Thurman, Marcos Maidana, Shawn Porter or Errol Spence, and then you want a rematch clause?

Hearn obviously feels confident that Brook can beat Rios, otherwise he would have hand-picked him for the fight. There’s got to be some worry there for Hearn about what Rios could potentially do to Brook.

Maybe Hearn sat down and watched Rios’ last fight against Mike Alvarado last January and come to the conclusion that Brook could actually lose this fight. Clinching, which is what Brook did in a high amount against Porter, might not work against Rios. He’s been trained to resist clinching and to keep throwing punches no matter how hard he’s being held by an opponent.

This means that every time Rios works his way to the inside, Brook is actually going to have to fight him because if he grabs Rios in a clinch, he can expect to be hit by him to the body and to the head. In other words, Rios will resist Brook’s constant clinching and look to score points by continuing to work.

The judges can’t ignore when a fighter is still throwing punches while being held 10+ times per round. If Brook chooses to clinch Rios like he did Porter, then Rios will win every round just based on the work that he does while being held by Brook. Gosh, I really hope Brook doesn’t resort to holding against Rios, because it would be so, so ugly if he goes that route.



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