By Allan Fox: Keith ‘One Time’ Thurman will be fighting on May 19th on Showtime Boxing, but his rumored fight against Jessie Vargas still has yet to be confirmed for his next title defense of his WBA/WBC welterweight titles at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York.
There are rumors that Thurman (28-0, 22 KOs) might not take the fight with Vargas, who could be a little too good for what is supposed to be a tune-up for the 28-year-old Florida native. If Thurman doesn’t fight Vargas, hopefully he at least takes on a contender.
The WBA and WBC need to hold Thurman’s feet to the fire by insisting that he fight a contender for his May 19th fight. We can’t have champions taking on soft jobs because they’re coming off of injuries and a long layoff. When champions come back from an injury, they’re supposed to be ready to fight. If they’re not, then they either need to ask the sanctioning bodies for more time for them to get ready or they should vacate the titles.
Thurman is predicting big things for the remainder of 2018 after his next title defense on May the 15th. The boxing fans are assuming that what Thurman means by him saying he’ll be in an exciting fight is he’ll finally agree to a unification fight against IBF welterweight champion Errol Spence Jr. (23-0, 20 KOs). That’s the fight that Spence is counting on taking place in December. Spence made it clear to the boxing media last Saturday night after his win over Lamont Peterson that he absolutely wants Thurman to fight him after he takes his tune-up fight on May 19th. Spence will not accept Thurman side stepping him in order to face Danny Garcia or Shawn Porter again. Those fights can wait, as the boxing fans have already seen Thurman beat both of them.
“2017 was a great year. Unifying the WBA and the WBC titles was a dream come true,” said Thurman. ”Since then, we had the elbow surgery but 2018 is a get-back year,” Thurman said. “I’m truly looking forward to being back in the ring May 19. After that, I’m going to bring a more exciting fight later on this year.”
Thurman is being vague by not mentioning Spence’s name. A smart fighter that wanted to increase interest in a fight against Spence would at least mention his name. Thurman not willing to utter Spence’s name, it suggests that he’s possibly thinking of sidestepping him in 2018 and focusing on just fighting rematches after he gets Jessie Vargas out of the way on May 19. You can’t say that Thurman is the bravest or the smartest fighter in the 147 lb. division.
If Thurman does take the fight with Jessie Vargas on May 19th, it could be a really tough one. Normally, I’d say that this would be a fairly easy fight for Thurman to win, as Vargas is slow and can be out-boxed by clever fighters. But with Thurman coming off of a 14-month layoff and elbow surgery, Vargas is in the right position to pull off an upset in this fight.
Spence is willing to give Thurman his tune-up come back slowly to the sport after his elbow surgery, but that’s it. Thurman can’t use up all of 2018 fighting retread opponents without facing Spence.
“There are a lot of contenders and champions gunning for my number one spot but I’m going to have to let them know that I’ll be right here at the top,” Thurman said.
Thurman sees himself as the No.1 welterweight. I don’t think that’s the case anymore. The boxing public is starting to view Spence as the top dog in the welterweight division. Thurman is coming off an unimpressive 12 round split decision win over Danny Garcia last March in which he looked anything but the best fighter in the 147 lb. division. Thurman’s 14-month layoff since then hurts his standing in the division. You can’t say you’re the best when you’re not fighting.
Spence will be fighting this summer on June 16 in Dallas. His opponent is expected to be Carlos Ocampo of Mexico. With Spence and Thurman fighting only a month apart, it should be easy for them to schedule a fight for October or November of this year. That’s the ideal thing to do. I don’t think Thurman is going to do that though. He’s likely to spend the remainder of 2018 fighting Shawn Porter and Danny Garcia before he looks to possibly tackle a fight against Spence in 2019.
It looks like Thurman’s opponents for 2018 will be in this order:
1. Jessie Vargas – this fight is still a big question mark for Thurman
2. Shawn Porter
3. Danny Garcia
This is the ideal situation IF Thurman doesn’t get injured again like he has in the last 2 years of his career. He says he wants to fight 3 times in 2018, but I imagine he wanted to fight 2 times in the last 2 years, and his increasingly brittle body wouldn’t allow him to fight more than 1 time. That works well with Thurman’s nickname ‘One Time.’
Vargas really wants to fight Thurman, as he seems him as a vulnerable champion right now with his body breaking down on him. Vargas is like a shark. He smells blood in the water and he’s ready to go after Thurman and tear him to pieces on May 19th. It’ll be interesting to see if Thurman ducks the fight with Vargas now after he’s had time to reflect on the fight.
Shawn Porter made it public last weekend by saying that Vargas is NOT a tune-up level fighter. He’s a lot better than that, and he feels that he’ll give Thurman a lot of trouble. It could be that Thurman might have caught wind of that interview by Porter, and he could be having second thoughts about whether it’s the smartest thing in the world for him to fight someone as good as Vargas. If Thurman isn’t 100 percent, Vargas will surely take advantage of that by going after his chin and maybe even knocking him out with a body shot. Thurman doesn’t take a shot as well as guys like Spence.