JUAREZ VICTORY WILL STOP PACQUIAO-MARQUEZ REMATCH
By Maloney L. Samaco
PhilBoxing.com
Sat, 20 Oct 2007
His real name is Ricardo Rocky Juarez, 27 years old, and was born in Houston, Texas. His professional record stands at 27 wins, 3 losses, with 19 wins by way of knockout. He is scheduled to face the man clamored to be the next Pacquiao foe, Juan Manuel Marquez of Mexico on November 3, 2007 in Tucson, Arizona for the WBC super featherweight championship.
A Juarez victory will erase what is left of the well-liked Pacquiao-Marquez rematch. It?s most likely that Pacquiao will face Juarez if he succeeds in wresting the crown from the Mexican champion. Or fight the winner of the Joan Guzman-Humberto Soto WBO junior lightweight championship. There is a strong demand for our ?national fist? to finally fight for the title and not only for the purse.
If that happens, then the old score to settle with Marquez will remain lingering in the minds of the boxing fans forever. Marquez will lose his marketability with a Juarez victory. Unless the promoters will gamble on a fight with Pacquiao facing an ex-champ going downhill like Marco Antonio Barrera.
Juarez? main drawback was his back-to-back losses to Barrera. He fought Barrera on May 20, 2006 in the Staples Center in Los Angeles, California. During the second half of the fight, Juarez took control by shaking Barrera who had his nose bleeding and had trouble holding his mouthpiece.
It was a very close fight, the bout was announced originally as a draw, but later it was discovered that two of the judges? scorecards had an error, and the decision was reversed granting Barrera the win by split decision. Despite the loss, Juarez gained notice from the boxing world by standing toe to toe with one of the best pound-for-pound boxers of all time.
The outcry was so loud from fight fans that a rematch took place on September 16, 2006 in Las Vegas. This time, Barrera outboxed Juarez and won a unanimous decision. But Rocky still gained the fans? admiration for his 'never quit' attitude and his persistence on exchanging blows with his foe.
Not a pushover, Juarez bounced back to win over Emmanuel Lucero by a 5th round TKO and a unanimous decision win over Jose Andres Hernandez. With Jorge Barrios being pulled out of his fight against Marquez, Juarez will now step in and face the Mexican world titlist.
Juarez had a shimmering amateur career with a 145-17 record, which included a 68 fight winning streak, a featherweight Olympic silver medal and a Junior Olympic World and National gold medal. In 1999 he won the world title at the 1999 World Amateur Boxing Championships in his home town Houston. During the 2000 Sydney Olympics finals, Juarez loss controversially against Bekzat Sattarkhanov of Kazakhstan who was warned several times for holding and not penalized. Rocky settled for the silver and accepted it.
Rocky is not a nickname but is a part of his real name. "It is my given name. My father was going to name me Rocky Marciano Juarez. But he just took out the Marciano and called me Rocky. It wasn't until I started boxing that people knew my middle name was Rocky. It was when I used to have my name on my trunks. They didn't allow nicknames in the amateurs, but I told them, it ain't a nickname,? declared Juarez.
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