DEAR FLYOD
By Hesiquio Balderas
PhilBoxing.com
Fri, 25 Sep 2009
Dear Floyd:
You have proven once again how smart you are.
You dominated a great fighter in Juan manuel Marquez is true, but Marquez is a fighter who basically fights 12 pounds south of your natural weight class of 147 pounds.
You chose Juan Manuel knowing that you would have all types of advantages over the brave Mexican warrior, and even then you violated the contract weight of 144 pounds when you came in at 146 pounds. You didn?t care about the fair play that should exist in all sports, you didn?t care about the honorability of such a beautiful sport as boxing, even less did you care that because of your lack of profesionalism (not making weight) you gave boxing another balck eye, (because believe me that was all the talk in Mexico and many other countries around the world). You chose to run like you normally do in your fights and cowardly you chose to pay Marquez for the fight to happen.
Juan Manuel Marquez knew he was used and he went after the money, but you picked him as an oponent to make your comeback a succesful bussiness, with a great win, against a good name and Marquez had that, he was the number two in the pound for pound ranking a good small fighter that you know couldn?t hurt you. Marquez was heavy, slow and without the timing to compete with you, you would only laugh if Marquez would hit you, in all it wasn?t a competetive fight.
Your great skills as a fighter is not in discussion, your exquisite defense, adaptability to any style, speed, and your dedication to the sport of the colliflower ears, can only be compared to the greatest fighters of all time like Sugar Ray Robinson, Muhammad Ali, Henry Armstrong. But those great fighters are not only measured by the qualities that you have but by the quality of oppositions they faced.
Floyd, you?ve faced good fighters, but only when the time and the oportunity favors you, you?ve always run away from the fight that represent a threat to your undefeated record, you never wanted to face Paul Spadafora at lightweight, you always ducked him and with good reason because there are some videos of you two sparring and he gave you fits. You went after Jose Luis Castillo and he gave you a true beating in the first fight as you captured the WBC lightweight championship as a gift by the judges.
What about Kostya Tszyu at junior welterweight? You always challenged him but you never wanted to fight him, Miguel Cotto at welterweight you did what ever was possible to avoid him. Bob Arum offered you eight million dollars to fight Antonio Margarito but you as always rejected the offer and went to face an easier fight in Zab Judah.
You did face Oscar De La Hoya buy only when the "Golden Boy" was a shadow of what he once was and without a doubt in a very close fight in which many experts feel that the fight was at least a draw, you would only get a split decision victory.
Now you pretend to hide again, to run again from a real challenge, you mostly feel fear because Shane Mosley challenged you in front of the world on HBO just like Marquez and Hatton did (and they got the fight) and you know Shane is the real welterweight champion and that he has the size, the speed, and the skills to beat you.
But you want to fight Manny Pacquiao who is a great fighter and the real pound for pound king but because of the size difference you will probably do the same thing with Pacquiao as you did to Marquez as the style of Pacquiao plays right into what you want as he will come foward and you will counter punch him all night long and will cause trouble to the Pacman.
And you say no to "Sugar" because you might get diabetes, you don't want to fight the real welterweight champion, someone your own size.
If you have dignity and you love the sport as you say in the documentary HBO 24/7, face the best in your weight class, Paul Williams would be happy to come down to welterweight again to fight you, Cintron will be very happy to come down to welter, Andre Berto the new blood at your weight will take the oportunity, what about Antonio "Sheetrock Hands" Margarito? All of them would jump at the oportunity to shut your mouth, but you must face Mosley if you want credibility as champion.
The best fighters in the history of boxing have always fight against the best opposition available, the best against the best in their respective weight classes, if you truly care about what the media and fans say about you, If you want to be known as a great fighter and have the respect of the world of boxing, it would be sweet if you face the "Sugar Man" from Pomona, California.
Quit hiding Floyd.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Hesiquio Balderas.
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