Will Kell Brook duck Errol Spence Jr. fight?

By Boxing News - 10/26/2016 - Comments

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By Scott Gilfoid: IBF welterweight champion Kell Brook (36-1, 25 KOs) has been talking about wanting to fight everybody lately but the guy that he’s supposed to be facing in #1 IBF mandatory challenger Errol Spence Jr. (21-0, 18 KOs).

The International Boxing Federation is supposed to be giving Brook and Spence their marching orders on October 26th. It’ll be interesting to see if the IBF followed through with that or if they’re going to wait awhile for Brook to finish licking his wounds from his 5th round knockout loss to the talented wrecking machine Gennady “GGG” Golovkin last September.

The fight was a disaster for Brook, who was running from the word go. Things got progressively worse for Brook in the 5th round, which is when the fight was halted by the referee after Brook’s trainer Dominic Ingle threw in the white towel of surrender. Brook ended up with a broken right eye socket for his troubles. Brook has tried to whitewash the events of the Golovkin fight, but the reality was the fight was a disaster for him. Golovkin had Brook in the retreat mode from get go.

Brook and his promoter Eddie Hearn want a big money fight against Amir Khan, Saul “Canelo” Alvarez, Miguel Cotto, Manny Pacquiao or Floyd Mayweather Jr. in the first quarter of 2017. Spence is not a big money fight, but he is one that presents plenty of danger for Brook.

Spence is someone that could unquestionably do the same thing to Brook that Golovkin did. This time, however, Brook wouldn’t get a free pass by him explaining away the loss because he was facing a guy that was bigger than him in Golovkin or him having suffered an eye injury. If Brook loses to Spence, he would need to take responsibility for the loss by owning it. In other words, an excuse won’t work this time.

If Brook tries to come up with excuse to tell the boxing public to explain away a loss to Spence, it would be bad news for his career. You can’t cry wolf every time you get beaten. You’ve got to admit it, because the fans see through the excuses when a fighter uses them over and over again.

My guess is Brook is going to hold onto the IBF title until the last minute before he vacates the belt. I don’t see him fighting Spence, ever.