By Dan Ambrose: After toiling for 10 long years as a professional fighter, Michael Jennings (34-2, 16 KOs) finally got his big chance two weeks again in an attempt at fighting for the vacant WBO welterweight title against Miguel Cotto (33-1, 27 KOs) at Madison Square Garden, in New York. Unfortunately, things didn’t go as Jennings would like for them to and he ultimately was stopped quite easily in a 5th round TKO loss to Cotto.
Maybe if Jennings has at least fought competitively in the fight, he might be looked at favorably for a shot against one of the other welterweight champions in the division. However, getting blown out of the water by Cotto and not fighting competitively in the least, it looks as if Jennings is going to have to slink back to fighting regional opposition only in England where he previously held the BBBofC British welterweight title.
At 31, ranked #3 in the WBO, Jennings could very well fight Cotto again sometime in the future if Jennings can keep winning against quality opposition in the welterweight division. That, it seems, is a problem for him, because judging by the way he looked against Cotto, I would have a hard time seeing Jennings beating a top welterweight in a title eliminator match.
I think with his boxing skills and movement, he could give some of the greener welterweights in the division, fighters like Jesus Soto Karass, Antonin Decaire, Rafal Jackiewicz and Euri Gonzalez some problems, but I’m less certain that he could beat any of them. That’s not to say that they’re any good, because for me they’re pretty average fighters, but Jennings would need to at least have some power if he hopes to beat any of them.
They’re all clearly a level above what Jennings has faced throughout his career when fighting mostly European fighters in England. I think Jennings would be better off going after them rather than going back to England and becoming mostly an opponent for up and coming British welterweights like Kell Brooks.
I doubt that Jennings would do much better against Brooks than he did against Cotto and would only stand to further hurt his career by sticking around and fighting those guys. He’s already made a name for him, albeit not a particularly good one, by facing Cotto and he needs to keep his head in the division against good fighters rather than slinking off and fighting only British fighters again.
That would be a big step down for Jennings and I wouldn’t advise for him to take that step yet. Once he starts taking a beating against fighters like Karass, Gonzalez and Jackiewicz, then by all means, Jennings should go back to fighting on the regional level and finish out his career there as an opponent, but I think it’s still too premature to take that step at this point in his career.
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