By Scott Gilfoid: Errol Spence Jr. (22-0, 19 KOs) just finished bagging the IBF welterweight title off of champion Kell Brook (36-2, 25 KOs) last Saturday night in stopping him in the 11th round in England. The win over Brook let the boxing world know that there is a new star in the welterweight division in Spence, and he’s ready to win all of the remaining world titles in the division Spence ‘s win over Brook came against arguably the second best fighter at 147.
Everything from here could be a downhill slope for Spence. The question is who will Spence be fighting next? After stopping Brook, Spence let the boxing fans know that he wants Thurman next. However, for that fight to take place, Spence will need to sit back and wait on Thurman to recover from his elbow surgery that he just finished having performed. Thurman believes he’ll be back inside the ring with a full recovery by December.
There probably won’t be a rematch between Spence and Brook in the future. Brook is looking at a surgery to repair his broken left eye socket that he suffered in the Spence fight, Once that’s over with, it’s going to take Brook many months before able to fight again. Brook was out of action for 8 months after suffering his right broken eye socket last September against Gennady Golovkin. If Brook has his eye surgery in June, we’re probably looking at February for his ring return.
Spence won’t be the one he faces at that. Brook’s promoter Eddie Hearn wants him to take a tune-up fight at 154, and then face Amir Khan in the summer. As such, Brook is in another direction from Spence. The only way I see Brook and Spence ever meeting again is if Brook is able to win one of the 154 pound titles, and hold onto it for a long period of time.
Spence will eventually be moving up in weight to the junior middleweight division. That means he cross paths with Brook if he’s dominant in his new weight class. With Brook suffering eye injuries at an alarming rate, I wouldn’t count on him and Spence ever fighting each other again. Frankly, I see retirement just around the corner for Brook.
Here are Spence’s options for his next fight:
– Keith Thurman: This is the guy that Spence wants most of all, as Thurman has the WBA/WBC welterweight titles in his possession. The problem that Spence has in getting a fight against Thurman is will involve a lot of waiting around. Spence had to wait 9 months for his fight with Brook due to him coming off eye injury from his fight with Gennady “GGG” Golovkin. Spence cannot afford to sit out of the ring for 6 more months waiting for Thurman to finish licking his wounds from his surgery. Spence is in the height of his career. He cannot afford to wait 6-9 months at a time for these broken down fighters to finally be healthy enough to face him.
– Danny Garcia: Would Garcia be interested in facing Spence next? Definitely not in my opinion. Garcia wants a rematch with Thurman so that he can avenge his loss to him. He’s not going to take on Spence, even though it would give him an opportunity to win the IBF welterweight title. If the Thurman wasn’t there for Garcia, he would go after a fight with Spence. It would be the only chance he has to fight for a world title. WBO champion Manny Pacquiao wouldn’t likely give Garcia a shot. This would be a great fight for Spence, matching him against a former 2-division world champion in Danny Garcia. We saw how many problems Garcia (33-1, 19 KOs) gave Keith Thurman recently in their fight on March 4. Garcia lost a 12 round split decision. He started off bad but stuck to it and came back strong in the second half of the fight. However, Thurman seemed to play it safe in that fight. Spence isn’t that kind of fighter. He would go after Garcia from the 1st round and he wouldn’t ease up on him the way that Thurman did. Spence would be trying to wear Garcia down with body shots in the same way he did with Brook. It would be tough on Garcia to make it the distance against a puncher like Spence.
– Shawn Porter: Fighting Porter would be an exciting match for Spence, as it would attract a lot of interest in the boxing world because it would be a highly entertaining fight. With that said, Porter isn’t about to take the fight with Spence. He’s already made that clear. Porter is waiting for his rematch with Thurman, who beat him by a close 12 round unanimous decision last year. Porter put himself in position for a rematch with Thurman in beating Andre Berto to earn a second fight with Thurman. Porter isn’t going to mess things up by taking on a risky opponent in Spence.
Unfortunately for Spence, he’s not going to get any of the big 3 fighters mentioned above for his next fight. Those guys are going in a different direction than Spence for their next fight. Porter and Garcia are going to hang back in a holding pattern until they get a rematch with Thurman. I see them either staying inactive or waiting until they get their rematch with Thurman or they’ll take a tune-up fight to stay busy. Spence will have to make a title defense of his International Boxing Federation belt against one of the available contenders in the IBF’s top 15 ranking.
Here are some possibilities from the IBF’s top 15 rankings for Spence’s next fight:
– Carlos Ocampo
– Luis Collazo
– Konstantin Ponomarev
– Bradley Skeete
– Jose Benavidez
– Sadam Ali
– Cefereno Rodriguez
– Rashid Ellis
– Qudratillo Abduqaxorov
– Dusty Harrison
– Chris Van Heerden
– Ray Robinson
As you can see, the options for Spence’s next fight are TERRIBLE. Out of that bunch, the only one that has any real talent in my opinion is Collazo, but he’s not a great choice given his 7th round knockout loss to Keith Thurman in 2015. Collazo did defeat Sammy Vasquez by a 6th round knockout last February, but that was after Vasquez had already been beaten by Felix Diaz. Collazo would still be a good choice for Spence if he wants to fight someone that that the casual boxing fans will recognize. There are some casual fans that know who Collazo is.
The IBF’s rankings at welterweight are littered with obscure fighters with meager talent. There’s no upside in Spence facing any of those guys if he wants to increase his popularity in the boxing world. If Spence’s objective was to keep his IBF title for years and years, he could easily milk his belt with a lot of easy title defenses against the guys the IBF has ranked in their top 15. You can argue that the main reason Brook was able to keep his IBF title for 3 years from 2014 to 2017 was because of the IBF’s less than impressive rankings. The IBF ranked Frankie Gavin, Kevin Bizier and Jo Jo Dan in their top 15. Heck, the IBF had Bizier and Dan as No.1 contenders. Talk about making it easy for Brook. If it weren’t for Spence, Brook would have a great chance to hold onto his IBF title for another 3 years. I don’t see anyone in the IBF’s top 15 that could best Brook, even now. Brook would beat all those guys in my view.