By Eric Thomas: Recently defeated Juan Manuel Marquez is reportedly looking at moving to the light welterweight division, and wants a fight with Ricky Hatton, according to the latest boxing news. As bad as the 36-year-old Marquez did against Floyd Mayweather Jr. last Saturday night, losing almost every round of the fight in a one-sided 12 round decision defeat, you would think that Marquez might want to move back down to the lightweight division where the opposition is decidedly smaller than the 150+ pound Mayweather.

However, Marquez’s promotional outfit Golden Boy Promotions is trying contacting Ricky Hatton to see if he would be interested in fighting Marquez. The chances of Hatton taking that fight are probably not too good. Hatton seems totally uninterested in fighting right now, and even if he was, it’s questionable whether Hatton would want to get Mayweather’s sloppy seconds.

Given how badly Marquez was beaten by Mayweather, it would be a fight where Hatton would be have to either dominate Marquez completely like Mayweather did or end up with pie in his face by falling short of that. Marquez might have been dominated by Mayweather, but he’d have a real chance at beating Hatton if he fought with as much determination as he did last Saturday night. Hatton hasn’t fought since losing a 2nd round knockout in May to Manny Pacquiao. Since that time, Hatton hasn’t shown any inclination to get back in the ring against anybody.

Marquez sees the light welterweight division as one where he might give it a shot, saying “Maybe I try to get a title right there.” But if Hatton and fighters like Amir Khan don’t show Marquez any interest in fighting, then Marquez should consider moving back down in weight. He might have problems against the faster light welterweights like Timothy Bradley and Devon Alexander, both of which are clever fighters in the Mayweather Jr-type mold.

Marquez wouldn’t get a lot of money against either of them and would likely look just as slow and hittable as he did against Mayweather. Marquez could probably catch up to them easier than he did with Mayweather, but he’d still have to deal with their much better hand speed and their youth. Marquez could end up getting beaten again if he stays at light welterweight.

The problem for him is that there’s no one for Marquez to fight if he moves back down to featherweight or the super featherweight divisions. Fighters like Roman Martinez, Robert Guerrero, Chris John, Steven Luevano, Jorge Linares and Humberto Soto are all good fighters but not fights that would bring in big cash.

One fighter who may end up being a huge pay-per-view star in the future is World Boxing Association featherweight champion Yuriorkis Gamboa. However, he’s still probably two or three years away from blossoming into a huge PPV star. Marquez can’t afford to wait around that long for it to happen.

This is why Marquez needs a fighter like Hatton to step up and fight him. Amir Khan would be a decent option, but it’s doubtful that his promoter would allow the 22-year-old Khan to fight Marquez right now. It’s one thing for Khan to be put in with a pretty much shot Marco Antonio Barrera and quite another matter for Khan to be facing a still potent fighter like Marquez.

I can see Khan fighting him some time, but only after Marquez is almost completely shot and is no longer a threat to Khan in the ring.