By Chris Williams: Trainer Freddie Roach is curious about Juan Manuel Marquez’s recent weight and muscle gain in the past year, and while he’s not accusing Marquez of using performance enhancing drugs [PEDs] he sure does seem awfully suspicious of it.

Roach told usatoday.com this about Marquez: “If [his body] is natural, I will kiss his a**. [Marquez] has gotten bigger and gained weight. It throws up a red flag.”

It looks like Roach is trying some gamesmanship to try and upset Marquez so that his fighter Pacquiao can gain an edge.

Marquez has always had the perfect body to gain muscle, but never attempted to add muscle to his frame in a big way because he was fighting featherweight and there was no reason to. However, after Marquez moved up from lightweight, he hired an expert strength and conditioning coach Angel Hernandez who has worked wonders in building up Marquez’s strength and size through natural means.

Marquez has passed every test for performance enhancing drugs and he’s not turned down tests for fear of needles or having an excuse that it weakens him. Marquez isn’t afraid to take tests and he’s got no excuses about being weakened when taking the tests.

You’ve got to give Marquez a lot of credit for putting on muscle and increasing his weight late in his career. Not too many fighters can do this and still be successful. Marquez has done it and the muscle weight hasn’t slowed him down any. If anything, Marquez is even better than he was before.

With his new muscles, Marquez has taken away the one advantage that Pacquiao had over him, and made it a negative for the Filipino fighter. Marquez is now the stronger fighter with the bigger punch. He may not be as fast as Pacquiao, but he hits harder than him with every shot and he definitely got the better of Pacquiao in their last fight.