By Scott Gilfoid: According to WBC cruiserweight champion Tony Bellew, the fight between IBF welterweight champion Kell “Special K” Brook (36-1, 25 KOs) and No.1 IBF Errol Spence Jr. (21-0, 18 KOs) is a 50-50 fight that will make only one-tenth the amount of money that a fight between Brook and Amir Khan (31-4, 19 KOs) will bring in.
Bellew thinks Brook and Khan should face each other instead of other fighters. There are a couple of problems that are preventing them from facing each other straightaway. Firstly, Khan wants a tune-up fight in April, because he’s coming off of hand surgery and a REALLY bad knockout loss to middleweight contender Saul “Canelo” Alvarez last year in May 2015.
Khan wants/needs the tune-up to make sure his surgically repaired right hand is able to handle fighting the better opposition. Secondly, the International Boxing Federation has ordered Brook to defend his title against No.1 IBF Errol Spence Jr. in his next fight. Brook, 30, has said it himself that he doesn’t wish to vacate his IBF title, which he worked so hard to get.
If Brook holds with that stance of not wanting to give up his IBF title, then it means he has to face Spence next. The IBF has already ordered a purse bid for the Brook vs. Spence fight on February 25. If Brook is going to vacate his IBF title to avoid the Spence fight, then he’s going to need to do it soon. He would be wasting Spence’s time if all he’s going to do is wait until February 25 before saying he wants no part of Spence.
With Khan taking a tune-up in April, Brook is going to have to fight someone unless he wants to wait until the summer before fighting Khan. I don’t think that would be the smartest move Brook could take. He needs to stay active, because he looked dreadful against Gennady Golovkin last September in running from him for five rounds before his trainer threw in the towel when he was finally forced to fight against the ropes.
Bellew said this to skysports.com about Brook vs. Spence being a 50-50 fight:
“Kell facing Errol Spence Jr is a 50-50 fight for basically a tenth of the amount of money he would get to face Amir,” said Bellew. “Kell Brook against Amir Khan will capture people’s imaginations and to be totally honest, both have got nowhere else to go.”
It sounds like Bellew hasn’t watched too much boxing in the last two years, because if he had, he’d have known already how talented Errol Spence Jr. is. He’s seen as the future of the welterweight division. It’s just a question of Spence beating Brook. It’s a question of how BADLY Spence will beat Brook. Will it be another Golovkin vs. Brook beat down or will it be a slightly competitive one where Brook is clinching Spence 10+ times per round to try and nullify his punching power?
If Brook doesn’t run or hold all night long, he’s likely going to get mowed down by Spence straightaway. Spence is a body puncher, and he’s seen as the best in the welterweight division in that department. Brook is good at avoiding head shots, but he’s not so great at avoiding body shots, as we saw in the 5th round of his last fight against Golovkin.
Brook was hurt from a body shot from Golovkin in that round. That was the reason why Brook stopped throwing punches. Spence and his trainer are obviously going to see how Brook can’t take it to the body. If Brook doesn’t vacate to avoid the Spence fight, he’s going to get worked over to the body and likely stopped in that manner.
There’s not much Brook can do about it other than vacate to avoid the loss in my opinion. Brook can move his head all night long against Spence in hopes of getting out of the way of his power shots. The problem is Spence is going to be throwing body shots mainly, so Brook’s head movement will be pointless to say the least.
I think Bellew is undervaluing Brook and Khan in terms of their career options. I think they both have other options if they don’t face each other. I mean, I don’t know if those options are winnable ones for either of them, but I do think they have options.
Khan is ranked #1 by the World Boxing Council at 147, which means he can fight for a world title against the winner of the March 4 fight between WBC champion Danny Garcia and WBA 147lb champion Keith “One Time” Thurman. That’s a GREAT option for Khan. Fighting for the WBA and WBC world titles will at least give Khan a chance to snatch two titles at one. If Khan wins that fight, then he can temporarily resurrect his career.
As for Brook, he can defend his IBF welterweight title against his mandatory contender Errol Spence, who some boxing fans see as the next Floyd Mayweather Jr.
“They both need each other massively, because there are no big fights out there for either one of them, unless they face each other,” said Bellew about Brook and Khan. “I know Amir and Kell think differently to that, but the truth of the matter is, they both need each other.”
I think Brook vs. the Garcia vs. Thurman winner would be a big fight. He’s not going to get either of those guys to fight him if he doesn’t fight Spence. Brooks’ resume is PAINFULLY weak when it comes to talented fighters. Brook has only fought two good opponents in his entire 13-year pro career and that was Golovkin and Shawn Porter.
Brook beat Porter by a 12 round majority decision in 2014, and he was stopped by Golovkin. As such, Brook’s record is 1-1 in meaningful fights. That’s not good, is it? I thought Porter was robbed in the Brook fight, as he landed the more meaningful punches, and he was the one taking the fight to him. The referee didn’t do anything to address Brook’s frequent holding in that fight.
I thought that was pretty sad, because Brook was clearly holding as part of a strategy to slow down Porter’s offense. It interfered with the flow of the fight, making it more of a standup wrestling affair rather than an actual fight. Porter had never fought anyone that would hold in this manner, so he wasn’t ready for it. He wasn’t fighting through the clinches, he wasn’t hitting Brook low, and he wasn’t roughing him up.
That’s what some fighters do when they’ve got an opponent that is using a game on the system by holding all night long. If you’ve got a referee that is going to let that stuff go, then you’ve got to reciprocate by turning the fight into an all-out roughhouse tactic to force the referee to do his job.
“Amir is talking about facing someone like Danny Garcia, which is crazy because I just think strip it all down – these two are massive names in Britain and British boxing is absolutely booming at the minute, and they should face each other. Simple as that,” said Bellew.
It’s not that simple, Bellew. Khan wants a tune-up, which means there will be no Khan-Brook fight in the first half of 2017. Brook can either vacate his IBF title and sit around and wait on the Khan fight or he can do the brave thing by taking on Spence and at least try and win. I don’t think Brook will, but at least he should try and stand his ground and fight this time rather than running like he did against Golovkin.