By Dan Ambrose: Former WBC 147 lb. champion Victor Ortiz (29-4-2, 22 KO’s) has an important fight coming up next month on January 30th against Luis Collazo (34-5, 17 KO’s) at the Barclays Center, in Brooklyn, New York, USA. This is a tune-up bout for Ortiz scheduled for 10 rounds and not 12. Like his last fight a year and a half ago against Josesito Lopez, Ortiz is expected to win this one against Collazo.
The worry here is that if Ortiz can’t beat Collazo, and if he gets beaten or if he quits yet again, for whatever reason, his boxing career may be pretty much done as far as him being a relevant fighter.
Ortiz quit against Lopez, Marcos Maidana and someone say in his fight against Lamont Peterson when faced with adversity. Ortiz suffered a broken jaw in the Lopez fight last year in June. But Ortiz was having problems in that fight long before his jaw was broken, as he was getting nailed frequently by Lopez with silly shots that he shouldn’t have been getting hit with. The jaw injury took 8 months to heal, and Ortiz could have returned to the ring in 2013 to fight, but instead he chose to be in a movie by Sylvester Stallone and take the entire year off from boxing. That right there makes you question Ortiz’s desire and love of the sport.
If he’s going to be taking a year off from boxing in the prime of his career, it might not be the sport for him. Floyd Mayweather Jr. can do that kid of thing because he’s a huge talent, but Ortiz is just a welterweight contender still trying to find his place in the division. For him to take off a year, it’s not a smart thing to do, and I wouldn’t expect him to be able to quickly get back to the level where he was before.
Ortiz says he wants to get the big fights against the likes of Mayweather Jr. and Saul “Canelo” Alvarez. He was already whipped by Mayweather in a 4th round TKO loss in September of 2011, so that door is probably permanently closed no matter what Ortiz does in the next year or two. But he can get some good fights if he stays active and beats some relevant fighters. There’s talk that Ortiz could face Danny Garcia in 2014 if he beats Collazo and looks impressive in doing so. If Ortiz struggles, gets knocked down or quits in the Collazo fight, then you can forget about him fighting Garcia. That’s why the Collazo fight is so important for Garcia. He has to win and look good in this fight, because he can’t afford anymore slip ups at this point.
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