By Dan Ambrose: Marcos “Chino” Maidana has announced his official retirement from boxing as of Tuesday, according to ESPN. The 35-year-old Maidana (35-5, 31 KOs) hadn’t fought in almost two years since losing to Floyd Mayweather Jr. by a 12 round unanimous decision in September 2014.
Maidana made a lot of money in his two fights against Mayweather, and he didn’t need to continue his boxing career after those two fights. Additionally, had Maidana chose to continue fighting, he likely wouldn’t have made the same kind of money that he’s gotten in the Mayweather fights.
There’s a chance that Maidana could have made good money for fights against the likes of Saul “Canelo” Alvarez, but he would have been giving away a lot of weight against him.
“After a long time out of the ring and thinking a lot since my last fight, I have decided to hang up my gloves,” said Maidana via a statement to ESPN Deportes. “Surely, my decision will not cause much surprise, because somehow and came forward in recent months. But today the intention is official.”
Besides his two fights against Mayweather, Maidana fought and defeated Adrien Broner, Josesito Lopez and Jose Soto-Karass. Maidana lost a controversial decision Andriy Kotelnik in 2009, and had Amir Khan ready to be knocked out in the 10th round of their strange fight in 2010. That was the fight where Maidana had trouble trying to finish Khan off after hurting him due to the referee constantly pulling him apart and not letting him work in close.
Maidana still had a lot left after he fought Mayweather for the second in 2014 and he could very well have continued fighting at a high level if he wanted to. However, Maidana gained a lot of weight in his time out of the ring, and he would have need to lose the weight for him to continue his career. It would have been very hard for him if he did decide to continue. Maidana is the type that easily could have taken the weight off it he chose to, but he decided he didn’t want to continue his career.
“I must say that I’m boxing very proud and deeply grateful to the sport for everything I got,” Maidana continued.” I never imagined go so far when I put on the gloves for the first time, when he was 15, in my native Margarita. I think I have left high the name of Argentina in the world after winning two world titles, winning and losing, but always against the best. Today, I no longer have the motivation, the sacred fire that is required. And so I announce my retirement.”
It’s too bad that Maidana has decided to retire because he was such an entertaining fighter. There aren’t too many fighters like him in the sport or in the 147lb division. The closest thing to Maidana in the welterweight division right now is Errol Spence Jr. and perhaps Frankie Gomez. Those two fighters like to come forward and slug like crazy and it’s very exciting to watch those guys fight.
Maidana boxing fans felt that Maidana deserved the win over Mayweather in their first fight in May 2014. Maidana lost the fight by a 12 round majority decision, but he appeared to have done enough to deserve the win. However, Maidana was fighting a very popular fighter in Mayweather, and you can’t just barely beat Mayweather if you want to get the decision. You have to really beat him and Maidana didn’t do that.