By Chris Williams: Bob Arum of Top Rank has wisely chosen to move his Top Rank card head-lined by WBO welterweight champion Timothy Bradley (30-0, 12 KO’s) vs. Juan Manuel Marquez (55-6-1, 40 KO’s) from September 14th to October 12th at the Thomas & Mack Center, in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA.
Arum was hoping that there would be an outside chance that Floyd Mayweather Jr. wouldn’t fight on the prestigious September 14th fight date so that he can put Bradley-Marquez. However, once it was clear that Mayweather would be fighting Saul “Canelo” Alvarez on that date, Arum quickly rescheduled the Bradley vs. Marquez fight to October 12th.
It’s really the only choice Arum had because if he got stubborn about it he’d have some scary low ratings for the Bradley-Marquez fight due to most boxing fans choosing to watch the much more interesting fight between Mayweather and Canelo.
It’s not that Marquez-Bradley isn’t an interesting fight. It’s a good fight, but it’s not on the level of Mayweather-Canelo or even close to being that good.
Arum said to RingTV “We said from the get go that if Mayweather had reserved the date for September 14 and that if he was going to fight on September 14, then we would go to October 12. No big deal.”
It is kind of a big deal because the September 14th date is the much better date because it’s on the Mexican Independence holiday and that guarantees a lot of pay per view buys due to the Mexican fans wanting to see a good boxing fight while celebrating.
Marquez is Mexican and it would have brought good ratings for his fight with Bradley if Arum was able to get that fight date for them. The Bradley-Marquez fight will still bring in good ratings even in October and there’s nothing to compete with it on that date.
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