Chavez Jr. injures hand, bout with Hearns may be off – News

By Boxing News - 08/25/2011 - Comments

Image: Chavez Jr. injures hand, bout with Hearns may be off - NewsBy Eric Thomas: WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (43-0-1, 30 KO’s) has reportedly injured one of his hands and the injury is bad enough to where he may be forced to pull out of his scheduled September 17th fight against fringe contender Ronald Hearns (26-2, 20 KO’s).

Steve Kim of Maxboxing.com said this on his twitter page about Chavez’s injury: “Word is that Chavez Jr is claiming some hand injury and might pull out of Hearns bout. Some just think he’s fat (as usual). Lou Dibella, who promotes Hearns, says “I’m afraid he’s going to back out on [Peter] Manfredo on November 19.” This kid is a mess.”

The injury was supposed to have occurred three weeks ago. However, the odd thing is photos of Chavez Jr. and Antonio Margarito were surfaced yesterday showing them at a sparring session in Tijuana, Mexico. Chavez Jr. looked really big, not anywhere near the 160 pound limit where he needs to be by September 17th.

It’s going to be tough for Chavez Jr. to take that weight off by September 17th if his hand does heal quickly enough for the fight to go on scheduled. Chavez Jr. re-hydrated up to 180 lbs after making weight for his last fight against Sebastian Zbik last June. He’s clearly pushing it to continue to fight at middleweight and might be better off moving up in weight to 168.

Chavez’s trainer Freddie Roach and promoters from Top Rank likely won’t be disappointed that Chavez’s fight with Hearns doesn’t go through because they didn’t want Chavez Jr. to take this fight. They wanted him to wait until the November 19th fight against Manfredo to fight because Roach won’t be available to train Chavez Jr. for the Hearns fight because he’s busy training Manny Pacquiao.



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