Tim Bradley vacates WBO 147lb title

By Boxing News - 02/10/2016 - Comments

bradley99999By Chris Williams: Tim Bradley (33-1-1, 13 KOs) has vacated his WBO welterweight title as of Tuesday.

Bradley, 33, had little choice but to give up his WBO 147lb title because he chose to bypass his #1 WBO mandatory challenger Sadam Ali in favor of fighting Manny Pacquiao on April 9. If Bradley had taken the Ali fight, which has to be seen as a 50-50 fight, he wouldn’t have gotten the third fight against Pacquiao. The money for the Pacquiao fight is obviously much more than what Bradley would have received for facing Ali.

Bradley could have given Ali a step aside fee so that he could face Pacquiao, but I’m not sure that the World Boxing Organization would have gone along with that.

Here’s the e-mail Bradley sent to WBO president Paco Valcarcel via Fightnews.com:

“Dear Paco: As you know I will be fighting Manny Pacquiao on April 9, 2016, in Las Vegas, NV. To accept this fight invariably means I cannot comply with my mandatory obligation and must forgo the mandatory challenger against Sadam Ali, as ordered by the WBO. This is a difficult decision, but one I have to make to give fans the best fights as well as allow myself the toughest and biggest fights possible from both a competitive and financial perspective.”

It was pretty obvious that Bradley was going to vacate his WBO title before the title was stripped from him by the WBO. When Top Rank, the promoters for Bradley, sent out a press release this week for the Sadam Ali vs. Jessie Vargas for their March 5 fight on HBO, they included quotes from the two fighters where they were talking about fighting for the “vacant WBO welterweight title.” It was clear then that the WBO title was going to be either vacated from Bradley or stripped from him. If Vargas beats Ali, then it’ll be a continuation of Top Rank having one of their own fighters holding the WBO 147lb title. It would be interesting how the WBO title would be passed from one Top Rank fighter to another. Top Rank fighter Terence Crawford holds the WBO 140lb title.

If Bradley really valued his WBO 147lb title, he could always said no to the third fight against Pacquiao and chosen instead to face Sadam Ali. However, Bradley isn’t much of a puncher, and even if he did beat Ali, he likely wouldn’t be holding onto the WBO belt for long anyway. Sooner or later, he would need to fight someone with some pop in their punches, and I think he would lose. Having Teddy Atlas as his new trainer wouldn’t Bradley if he ever had to face someone like Amir Khan, Shawn Porter, Errol Spence Jr. or Dmitry Mikhaylenko.



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