By Dan Ambrose: Sandor Martin has stepped in to replace the ill Jose Pedraza in the main event against Teofimo Lopez on December 10th on ESPN+ at Madison Square Garden in New York.
The former two-division world champion Pedraza had to pull out of the fight with former unified lightweight champion Teofimo (17-1, 13 KOs) due to a non-COVID-19 related illness.
Sandor already sent Mikey Garcia into retirement in 2o21. Will he do the same with Teofimo? Some boxing fans feel that Teo doesn’t possess the mental strength to be a top-level fighter, as he crumbled a year ago getting outsmarted by the Aussie George Kambosos Jr.
The fact that Teofimo made excuses and was in denial about his loss made it all the worse. To top it off, Teo chose not even try to avenge his loss to Kambosos, which suggests that he lacked confidence.
Fortunately for Top Rank, they got #5 WBC, #6 WBO, #11 WBA, and #15 IBF Martin (40-2, 13 KOs). This could work out for Top Rank in more than one way.
Not only was Top Rank able to get the highly-ranked Martin to take the fight, but they found a guy that could test whether Teofimo could cut the mustard at 140.
Sandor Martin has agreed to a deal to fight Teofimo Lopez on Dec. 10 in New York, sources tell ESPN. Jose Pedraza withdrew from the 140-pound bout with a non-COVID illness. Martin scored a career-best win last year with an upset of Mikey Garcia. An upgrade over Pedraza, IMO.
— Mike Coppinger (@MikeCoppinger) November 17, 2022
Martin, a crafty fighter that uses his IQ to win fights, could be a pure nightmare for Teofimo, who is vulnerable against intelligent fighters. We saw what Kambosos Jr did to Teofimo, outboxing him a year ago to snatch his three titles at lightweight.
If Teofimo loses to Sandor, it would be time for Top Rank to begin considering trimming the fat from their promotional company by getting rid of Teo because it would obvious he’s not the fighter that they thought he was.
This will be a good test to show whether Teofimo has the intellect & ability to be one of the major players at light welterweight.
It’s fair to say that if Teofimo can’t beat Sandor Martin, he’s destined for mediocrity at 140.
At that point, Teofimo would need to consider moving back down to 135, where his huge size gave him an advantage against the smaller fighters.
Teofimo arguably owes his success at lightweight to his huge size for that weight class. But now that he’s fighting at 140, he will need the ability to win fights because he can’t depend on being the much bigger guy.
In Teofimo’s debut at 140 last August against little-known second-tier opponent Pedro Campa, he didn’t look impressive in that fight, getting hit frequently and struggling until scoring a seventh-round knockout.
The way Teofimo looked against Campa, Top Rank should be taking it easy on him because he doesn’t look ready to face contenders at 140.
Of course, Top Rank should know now if they’re wasting their time with Teofimo because the last thing they can afford is to invest a lot of money in promoting a fighter that can’t compete with the best.