Hearn: Kell Brook is better than Thurman

By Boxing News - 07/01/2016 - Comments

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By Scott Gilfoid: IBF welterweight champion Kell Brook (36-0, 25 KOs) and WBA 147lb champion Keith “One Time” Thurman (27-0, 22 KOs) could be facing each other in the future if Brook’s promoter Eddie Hearn has anything to do with it. Hearn wants to match Brook against Thurman in a unification match if Brook can beat WBO welterweight champion Jessie Vargas in their fight in September.

Hearn likes Brook’s chances of beating Thurman to take his WBA strap. Indeed, Hearn thinks Brook is a better fighter than Thurman. I’m not sure that I agree with Hearn, but then again, I’ve seen Brook fight many times. I saw how Brook was out on his feet in the 12th round against Carson Jones in 2012. Somehow, I don’t think Thurman would ever be hurt by Jones, but Brook sure was.

“I watched the Keith Thurman-Shawn Porter fight the other night and I know Kell is better,” said Hearn in his column at the Dailymail. “He beat Porter in his backyard and after the Vargas fight we will look to make a fight with Thurman or Danny Garcia. He will have all the belts before long.”

Nah, I don’t think so, Eddie. I do not believe for a second that Brook can beat Thurman, especially if he tries to game the system like he did in the Porter fight by holding all night with the old ‘punch and grab’ technique. Thurman is too mobile to be beaten by the ‘punch and grab’ strategy. Unless Brook plans on chasing Thurman around the ring and throwing himself at him to hold him, I don’t see that strategy working. Eddie, there’s one thing that you’re forgetting about Brook. He’s soon going to need to fight his IBF mandatory challenger, and I believe that’s going to be the talented Errol Spence Jr. (20-0, 17 KOs) after he defeats 41-year-old Leonard Bundu in their IBF eliminator bout next month on August 21 at Coney Island, New York.

Brook isn’t going to be able to just put Spence on permanent ignore so that he can fight whoever he pleases. I hate to burst your bubble, Eddie, but Brook is going to need to face Spence if he wants to hold onto his IBF strap. To be sure, Brook can give up the IBF belt so that he can avoid fighting Spence, but it’s going to make him look REALLY bad when/if he does that. Spence is the future of the welterweight division, the next Floyd Mayweather Jr. in the eyes of many boxing fans. Brook isn’t going to be able to beat a talent like Spence by clinching him 10 to 15 times per round to keep him from throwing punches. I’m afraid that strategy would be a fail. Spence is too strong to be held over and over again, and he’s too smart. Spence will obviously have looked at Brook’s fight with Porter, and he’ll be working on fighting through the clinches to keep Brook from stalling out the fight with his ugly holding. If Brook tries to hold a strong fighter like Spence all night long, he’s going to get clubbed into submission by him. Spence will work an arm free and hammer Brook until he drops to the canvas.

Brook and Thurman have an opponent in common in Shawn Porter. While Thurman beat Porter in an exciting war last Saturday night to turn back the threat, Brook clinched his way to a very, very ugly win two years ago against Porter in 2014.

It was a fight where Porter looked like the better man, but he was helpless in the ring due to the nonstop clinching Brook was doing all night. The referee wasn’t helping Porter by penalizing Brook for his holding, so it was just Porter out there on an island dealing with a fighter that was not going to stop holding for anything.

“There has been some understandable frustration in the delays in announcing Kell Brook’s unification fight with WBO champion Jessie Vargas,” Hearn said. “The issues right now are very small. We are trying to get the right date in relation to the Eubank-Golovkin fight and we are also still discussing the US TV rights. This fight will happen.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KjSKpoXVdp8

Brook needs to get past Vargas before he can start talking about another unification fight against Thurman. I think Brook will beat Vargas, because he’s a pretty limited fighter. But I don’t think the IBF is going to let Brook just ignore Spence for the rest of his career while holding onto the IBF title. The IBF is going to force Brook to defend it against Spence if he wants to hold onto it.

Thus far, Brook has been lucky with the IBF installing two mediocre contenders as their #1 contenders in the last year in Jo Jo Dan and Kevin Bizier. The thing is, those guys didn’t have to do a whole heck of a lot to become Brook’s #1 mandatory.

Spence is being given a hoop to jump through by having to face Bundu after he already defeated an arguably superior fighter than him in Chris Algieri. That should have been enough for Spence to be Brook’s mandatory challenger, but the IBF is delaying the inevitable by having Spence fight Bundu. Heck, I don’t think it matters.

The IBF could throw 10 different guys in front of Spence if they wanted to, and he would clear them away one by one to get to Brook. There isn’t anyone in the IBF’s rankings with the talent to give Spence any problems in my view. We are talking about arguably what could be the best fighter in the welterweight division right now.

I think Spence would make easy work of Thurman, Shawn Porter, Tim Bradley, Danny Garcia and Jessie Vargas. That’s why I see it as useless for the IBF to throw a tiny speed bump into Spence’s path in the form of Bundu on August 21. The 5’6” Bundu is not going to be able to do anything to slow Spence’s path to his first world title against Brook.