By William Mackay: Juan Manuel Marquez has been counted out by a lot of boxing experts, many of who point to his lack of size, speed and his advanced age as reasons why he won’t match up with Floyd Mayweather Jr. on Saturday night. In some ways, Marquez is already seen as the loser without a punch being thrown. While it’s true that Marquez is undersized somewhat against Mayweather, but the difference isn’t really all that substantial when it comes down to the hard statistics.
Mayweather is only an inch taller at 5’8” compared to 5’7” for Marquez. In addition to that, Mayweather has a five inch reach advantage going for him with his 72” reach compared to Marquez’s 67. That could be a problem for Marquez if Mayweather chooses to fight on the run. However, in Mayweather’s last two fights against Oscar De La Hoya and Ricky Hatton, Mayweather mostly stood in front of Hatton and De La Hoya and used his torso and head movement to get out of the way of punches.
The reach likely won’t be anymore of an issue for Marquez than the height. Mayweather’s hand speed advantage will be the real problem for Marquez, because Mayweather will be able to land speedy single shots and fast combinations to get the better of Marquez.
However, Marquez is no stranger to fighters with fast hand speed, as he’s twice fought Manny Pacquiao, who is perhaps just as fast as Mayweather if not quicker with his hands. Marquez held his own against Pacquiao in two fights and figured out a way to land his punches after Pacquiao would throw his own.
The one difference between Pacquiao and Mayweather, besides the size difference, is that Pacquiao tends to over commit with his punches by putting his entire body behind them, whereas Mayweather likes to throw short quick shots that are almost arm punches. Mayweather does this obviously to avoid getting hit by counter shots from his opponents.
It works well for Mayweather because he can get a lot of power in his straight punches despite not winding up on them like Pacquiao typically does. Marquez will have to be able to adjust to this style of fighting. It seems likely that there will be fewer opportunities for Marquez to land his own counter punches because Mayweather, with his short, fast shots, won’t be giving him more than a fraction of a second to throw his own punches.
For Marquez, this will be the biggest fight of his career in terms of money. Marquez will be well paid for this fight, and after having fought twice against Pacquiao and against other notable fighters like Chris John and Marco Antonio Barrera, this is a long overdue mega payday for Marquez. This is his time to shine and he doesn’t want to blow it by going out and getting embarrassed by the crafty Mayweather.
This is why you can expect Marquez to fight as hard as he possibly can to get the win. Unless Mayweather loads up with something really big and takes Marquez out early, this is going to end up to be a grueling fight for both of them. Marquez, however, is used to fighting in this manner because most of his recent fights have turned into wars.
As for Mayweather, I can’t remember the last time that he was in a back and forth battle where he took a lot of heavy shots. It might be at least seven years, in his two fights with Jose Luis Castillo, since Mayweather was in with an opponent that landed a lot of big shots.
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