By Dave Lahr: I’m trying to figure out what exactly Floyd Mayweather Jr. will prove in beating Juan Manuel Marquez this Saturday night. He’s in an almost no win situation. I can’t find a lot of things to say what Mayweather will get from this fight, to be honest. For one, Mayweather is fighting at super featherweight (130 pounds) last year and only recently moved up to lightweight late last year. Two years ago, Marquez was fighting at featherweight and had fought at that weight since the start of his career in 1993.
Marquez is really a natural featherweight and was dominant at that weight. The only reason Marquez moved up at all to super featherweight was to chase Manny Pacquiao and try to get a fight with him. The same goes for the reason why Marquez moved up to lightweight (135). Marquez didn’t do that because he wanted to or needed to because he was putting on weight.
Marquez moved up to lightweight to go after Pacquiao. But at lightweight, Marquez is much weaker than he was at the lighter weights and has taken much more punishment. Now, Marquez is moving up essentially two more weight classes to fight Mayweather at 144, which is welterweight. That is not Marquez’s weight class, not even close. He’s going to be much too small and weak to compete with a fighter like Mayweather.
I don’t care that Marquez has put on nine pounds and is now weighing 144. He’s still not a welterweight or anything close to it. He’s a fighter that has moved up a number of weight classes in the past two years and is now moving up two more weights classes just to fight Mayweather on September 19th.
It’s not a fair fight. Mayweather is going to win this fight and win it easily. But what does it prove for Mayweather? What does he get out of a win like this? If he needs to fight smaller fighters in order to win, what does that say for him? He can probably continue to fight smaller guys for the next five to eight years and keep winning, just as long as he picks selects from increasingly smaller weight classes as he ages.
Who knows? Maybe Mayweather will end up fighting Vic Darchinyan, Nonito Donaire or Marvin Sonsona in the future someday. If the boxing public is willing to pay for it, why not make it happen?
I suppose Mayweather will prove something to the casual fans of the sport, which have no idea how far Marquez has had to move up in weight to make his fight with Mayweather a reality. For them, ignorance is bliss. They’ll have no idea that Marquez ever fought at a weight lower than 144, and will probably not care even if they did know.
They just want to see Mayweather fight, and are happy regardless. But true boxing fans of the sport will know, and might not see Mayweather’s win as something for him to be proud of. If Mayweather can fight pumped up lightweights like Juan Manuel Marquez and Manny Pacquiao, then why not fight a welterweight as well?
I can see other fighters doing this and I would be just as unhappy about it, because it’s an advantage for the bigger fighter, unless they’re somehow damaged in some way by either old age or ring wear. I know Oscar De La Hoya and Ricky Hatton failed when taking on the smaller Pacquiao, but Hatton and De La Hoya are hardly top level fighters in my view. I see them as celebrities, but not the cream of the crop in their respective divisions.
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