By Dan Ambrose: Top Rank promoter Bob Arum is confident that a fight between Miguel Cotto (38-4, 31 KO’s) and WBC middleweight champion Sergio Martinez (51-2-2, 28 KO’s) will be taking place on June 7th on New York on the Puerto Rico Independence Day weekend. Arum wants to stage the fight at the MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey.
Cotto turned down the $10 million+ offer this week made by Golden Boy Promotions for him to fight Saul “Canelo” Alvarez on March 8th. Cotto is turning that fight down at this time, but he’ll likely come back to it after he faces Sergio Martinez. Of course, if Cotto gets knocked out by Sergio on June 7th, then the $10 million offer might not be there anymore. If Golden Boy still wants to match Canelo against a beaten Cotto in the 2nd part of 2014, it’s difficult to imagine Golden Boy’s $10 million offer still being on the table.
Arum likes the idea of staging the Cotto-Martinez fight inside the stadium because he can squeeze more fans inside the stadium, which has a seating capacity of 82,566, rather than Madison Square Garden in New York. The seating capacity for that venue is only 18,200. Being able to add more seats will potentially make the fighters a lot more money depending on the amount of interest.
Arum needs to make sure that it’s worth it to stage the Cotto-Martinez fight in such a big stadium, because it might not draw enough fans to make it worth it. There’s also the potential of it raining. It’s not common for it to rain in June in Jersey, but there’s always the potential.
“I’m optimistic that fight is going to happen,” Arum said to the LA Times. “It isn’t done yet, but there’s some magic in Miguel fighting in the New York area that weekend. We’re pricing the pros and cons of having another 10,000 to 20,000 people watching the fight outdoors against the expenses of making sure we’re covered from possible rain.”
Cotto’s interest in facing Sergio is so that he can try and capture his WBC 160 lb. title. If Cotto can win that belt, it would be his 4th division world title belt. Facing the soon to be 39-year-old Sergio gives Cotto a much better chance than if he were to face the middleweight division’s best fighter Gennady Golovkin. He’s seen as the real champion at 160, whereas the other champions are seen mostly as belt holders by a lot of fans.
It’s interesting that Cotto isn’t going after the perceived best fighter in the middleweight division. I guess it doesn’t matter after Cotto’s retired from the sport, because fans will look at his record and be impressed that he’s won 4 division world titles. But it still would be a lot more impressive if Cotto fought the actual best fighter in the middleweight division instead of just a belt holder.
Sergio looks like he’s lost a lot in the past year, as he barely beat a very average Martin Murray in his last fight in April. Sergio is starting to show age and it doesn’t look like he has too many more fights in him. Cotto likely wouldn’t stand a chance against Sergio from 4 years ago, but now that he’s gotten old, Sergio is vulnerable to Cotto now.
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