By Eric Thomas: Former three division world champion Juan Manuel Marquez (53-6-1, 39 KO’s) will be moving up in weight on April 21st to fight what amounts to be little more than a stay busy fight against unbeaten #1 World Boxing Organization ranked Argentinian Cesar Rene Cuenca (42-0, 1 KO’s) in Mexico City, Mexico. The southpaw Cuenca, 31, is a 10-year pro with a completely padded record.
It’s hard to believe a guy would fight 10 years as a pro and never once face a top tier contender in all those years, especially with the padded record. But it looks like Cuenca has been content until now facing the guys he’s been facing. As you can see from his one KO on his resume, Cuenca doesn’t have much in the way of power going for him.
I took a look at a couple of Cuenca’s fights on Youtube and what jumped out at me in looking at him is how slow and amateurish he is. He’s got very slow hands and he fights in a kind of wild manner at times that doesn’t usually show itself in professionals with as many fights as he has under his belt. I don’t know the WBO decided to rank Cuenca at number #1, because none of the sanctioning bodies have him ranked at all in the top 15, and it’s easy to see why. Cuenca doesn’t look very good at all, and I’d have a hard time finding one guy in the top 15 he could be anywhere among the four sanctioning bodies.
It’s hard to imagine what Marquez is looking for in taking on a guy with some mediocre skills and with an incredibly inflated record. Marquez looks to be trying to kill two birds with one stone. On the one hand he wants to try and capture a fourth division world title by going after the #1 WBO ranked contender Cuenca. But in choosing a southpaw, Marquez could be staying sharp for a hoped for fourth fight against WBO welterweight champion Manny Pacquiao in 2012.
That’s the fight that Marquez really wants and he’s already said that if he doesn’t get the fight against Pacquiao this year then he’ll turn around and retire from boxing. I think Marquez may need to do that because I don’t think Pacquiao will take that fight in 2012. Marquez was too competitive with Pacquiao in a 12 round decision loss last November, and I doubt that Pacquiao’s promoter Bob Arum will want to risk his money fighter by putting him back in with a guy that still has the talent despite his advanced age to beat him.
Marquez will easily beat Cuenca on April 21st. This won’t even be a fight. Cuenca is someone that would be better off facing the lower level guys he’s padded his record with for the past 10 years than to be facing a future boxing Hall of Famer in Marquez. This is going to be a terrible mismatch.
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