Bradley vs. Marquez

By Allan Fox: 40-year-old Juan Manuel Marquez (55-7-1, 40 KO’s) wasn’t ready to admit defeat tonight after his 12 round split decision defeat to WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley (31-0, 12 KO’s) in Las Vegas, Nevada. While Marquez may have lost the fight on the judges’ scorecards, he was unwilling to admit that Bradley was the better man tonight. Instead, his theme was that he should have won.

Marquez said after the fight “We came to win and we did. The judges saw something else.”

It’s too bad Marquez feels that the judges got it wrong because he’s probably not going to get a rematch with Bradley. There’s little doubt that Bradley will move on and look to fight either the winner of the Brandon Rios vs. Manny Pacquiao fight or Floyd Mayweather Jr., if possible.

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By Chris Williams: Juan Manuel Marquez (55-7-1, 40 KO’s) only has himself to blame for losing to WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley (31-0, 12 KO’s) by a 12 round split decision at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas, Nevada. Marquez fought as a counter-puncher rather than learning from Bradley’s last fight against Ruslan Provodnikov by coming forward and throwing punches in bunches.

Bradley has problems with fighters that throw a lot of punches, and Marquez never even tried that to get the edge on him. Instead of throwing a lot of punches, Marquez focused on throwing one punch at a time, and he showed way too much respect for Bradley’s weak punches.

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By Dan Ambrose: WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley (31-0, 12 KO’s) retained his title and kept his unbeaten record intact with a 12 round split decision victory over Juan Manuel Marquez (55-7-1, 40 KO’s) at the Thomas & Mack Center, in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA. The final judges scores were 115-113 for Marquez, 116-112 and 115-113 for Bradley.

Who you felt won depended on what you were looking for in the fight. If you appreciated action, then you thought that Marquez won. If you liked the movement from Bradley without many power punches landed, then you thought he won. It could have gone either way because Bradley stalled out the fight in most of the rounds, and he cruised in the last 5 rounds without working hard. That made it hard to give Bradley any of the last 5 rounds of the fight.

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By Mark Havey: Promotional spin Doctors could easily have billed this fight as the ‘Battle of the Conquerors’. Both Juan Manuel Marquez and WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley have something in common, they beat Manny Pacquiao. it would be more accurate to say they both have wins against Pacquiao on their record.

Juan Manuel Marquez had a point to prove after failing to beat Manny Pacquiao in 3 fights. Debates are always fierce between fans in regards to the winner of the first 3 battles. All were good, but all were close. The 4th fight was entirely different. Both men were clearly going for the knockout and taking chances. In the 6th round Marquez landed a crushing counter, finally knocking out his nemesis in brutal fashion. If you thought that we finally had a decisive winner after four fights, you thought wrong. Fans accused Marquez of using illegal methods to gain his new found bulk and power. But the ending was still clear, Juan Manuel Marquez knocked out Manny Pacquiao.

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(Photo credit: Steve Lopez) By Rachel Aylett: The big card of the weekend takes place at the Thomas & Mack Centre in Las Vegas, Nevada, on Saturday, 12 October 2013. The fascinating main event pits the last two fighters to have defeated Manny Pacquiao against each other in one of the major showdowns of the year. If anyone’s still counting, Bradley’s WBO welterweight title belt is on the line. In fact, Marquez is definitely counting, as victory here would make him the first Mexican boxer to win major championship belts in five different weight classes.

Looking first at Marquez one is led to wonder how much desire and drive he can have left now that he has exorcised the demon of Pacquiao from his system. For those who have been living on Mars, Marquez finally got a victory over Pacman at the fourth attempt when he knocked him out in the sixth round in December 2012. That was Marquez’s last appearance in the ring. The above-mentioned record attempt will at least give him some incentive to beat Bradley but, at 40 years of age, he must be nearing the end of his wonderful career.

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(Photo credit: Steve Lopez) By Chris Williams: WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley (30-0, 12 KO’s) says he’s hoping that fans boo him tonight in his fight against Juan Manuel Marquez (55-6-1, 40 KO’s) in Las Vegas, because it brings him a lot of energy for some reason. Bradley has a lot of fans rooting against him due to his controversial win over Manny Pacquiao last year, and sometimes boring fighting style.

Bradley said this via Sky Sports “People booing, I love it. Boo me more, please; give me more fuel.”

If Bradley is being booed tonight, it won’t be because fans dislike him personally. It’ll likely be due to him running around the ring trying not to get hit by Marquez. If he runs from Marquez and chooses not to engage, then fans will boo Bradley all night long, and it won’t be a good thing for his career or for his chances of winning the fight.

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(Photo credit: Steve Lopez) By Simon Hirst: Tonight, Tim Bradley will defend his WBO light welterweight title against Juan Manuel Marquez in Las Vegas in what is a highly anticipated bout between the two Manny Pacquiao conquerors. Tim Bradley has openly said that winning this fight stamps his ticket into the hall of fame, which could be seen as a somewhat premature and controversial statement.

In looking over Bradley’s career, he won the WBC title via split decision over Junior Witter. It was a somewhat farcical decision as there was no doubt Bradley won the fight and to think Witter would have retained via draw had it not been from a booming overhand right in the 6th round. He then fought Kendall Holt in which Holt knocked him down twice, before using his boxing to claim a unanimous decision.

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(Photo credit: HBO/Will HartBy Eric Thomas: WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley (30-0, 12 KO’s) weighed in 1.5 lbs. more than Juan Manuel Marquez (55-6-1, 40 KO’s) during Friday’s weight for Saturday’s pay-per-view fight on HBO. Bradley weighed in at 146 lbs, whereas Marquez came in at 144.5 lbs.

This is really not much of a surprise because Bradley has become quite heavy in between fights, and he’s been fighting at 147 for a lot longer than Marquez.

The real test is how well Bradley moves around the ring on Saturday night, as he’s going to need his foot speed to keep from getting nailed by Marquez’s big hooks and uppercuts.

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By Chris Williams: WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley (30-0, 12 KO’s) sees great things for himself if beats Juan Manuel Marquez (55-6-1, 40 KO’s) this Saturday night on HBO from the Thomas & Mack Center, in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA. Bradley expects that Marquez will retire after the loss, and that he himself will be pushed up the pound-for-pound rankings by Ring Magazine from No.8 to No.1-3. Bradley sees a victory over Marquez as being a big enough win to accomplish that.

Bradley said to ESPN “Beating Marquez, that right there will make me one of the top pound-for-pound fighters in the world — No.1, No.2, No.3…by having two guys on my resume [Marquez and Pacquiao] who are by far the best fighters in the world, [future] Hall of Famers…if I could beat both of these guys, I would be considered one of the best.”

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By Chris Williams: Juan Manuel Marquez (55-6-1, 40 KO’s) will beat WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley (30-0, 12 KO’s) this Saturday night in their pay-per-view bout on HBO from Las Vegas, Nevada, according to Dan Rafael of ESPN. He sees Marquez’s superior power and counter punching ability being too much for the weaker but much faster 30-year-old Bradley.

Rafael doesn’t think Bradley’s hand speed will be enough of a factor for him to beat Marquez in this fight.

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