Martinez vs. Chavez Jr: “Nature versus Nurture”

09/14/201609/02/2012 Eddy Pronishev

Martinez vs. Chavez Jr: “Nature versus Nurture” by Marc Livitz: Provided the Mayan prophecy doesn’t turn us all inside out and upside down, we may find anywhere from a glimmer to a thermal radiation flash’s worth of excitement in the time left for boxing in 2012. There’s always hope for a sport which although is somewhat in the periphery of many continues to refresh itself in so many different ways.

The gym ghosts of years past are not exactly smiling, but they are at least maintaining a healthy smirk. Outside of the consistent barrage of “the big one”, various promoters have managed to see the light and throw together some interesting contests for the fall. As most of us know by now, the middleweight title (most of it) will be on the line in two weeks’ time.

A matchup between Julio Cesar Chavez, Jr. and Sergio Martinez should satiate even the most discriminating pugilistic palate. So many in and around the fight game swore to the gills that little Julio was struck with terror in regards to a night in the ring with “Maravilla”.

Sergio Martinez: I’m going to KO Chavez Jr to avoid getting a bad decision

09/14/201608/31/2012 Eddy Pronishev

By Rob Smith: Sergio Martinez (49-2-2, 28 KO’s) plans on taking the Las Vegas judges out of the equation when he meets the highly popular WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (46-0-1, 32 KO’s) next month on September 15th in their HBO televised pay per view bout at at the Thomas & Mack Center. The fight goes for $49.99 for boxing fans interested in purchasing it on cable. Martinez feels that he’s going to need to knock Chavez Jr. clean out in order to avoid getting jobbed in this fight. He doesn’t have a lot of faith that the judges will give him, a less popular fighter, the decision.

Martinez said this as quoted by the World Boxing Council website: “I’m preparing to defeat Chavez by knockout in order to avoid a bad decision.”

Although Martinez didn’t say specifically why he felt that he needs to KO Chavez Jr. in order to win, he might be referring to Chavez Jr’s controversial fights with Matt Vanda and Carlos Molina in the past. Chavez Jr. got a draw and a decision over Molina in their two fights in 2005 and 2006, and a lot of boxing fans felt that Chavez Jr. deserved to lose at least one, if not two, of those fights.

Chavez Jr. looking kind of flabby for Martinez fight

08/31/2012 Eddy Pronishev

By Rob Smith: With only two weeks to go before their big fight in Las Vegas, WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (46-0-1, 32 KO’s) is still kind of flabby around the neck and jowls for his fight against Sergio Martinez (49-2-2, 28 KO’s) on September 15th at the Thomas & Mack Center in Las Vegas, Nevada. I’m not sure what’s missing from Chavez Jr’s training camp because I’ve never seen him so fat before a fight before. Judging from recent photos taken of him on fightnews.com, Chavez Jr has little double chin going and his face looks flabby like he’s been eating too good.

Chavez Jr-Martinez, Sturm-Geale, Dawson-Ward: Three Significant Boxing Fights In September

09/14/201608/29/2012 Eddy Pronishev

By James Stillerman – Sergio “Maravilla” Martinez, 49-2-2, 28 KOs squares off against Julio Caesar Chavez Jr., 46-0-1, 32KOs for the WBC middleweight title and the right to be claimed the best middleweight pugilist in the world on September 15th at the Thomas Mack Center in Las Vegas, Nevada, in a twelve round main event. This is an intriguing matchup of a young towering undefeated and upcoming fighter in Chavez Jr. versus the smaller crafty season veteran in Martinez, who is considered by many boxing experts as the best fighter in the world not named Floyd Mayweather or Manny Pacquiao.

Adding excitement to this bout is the fact that both men greatly despise one another other and have repeatedly said that they will end the boxing career of the other fighter in the ring, making it appear that this fight will be an all out action packed event.

Martinez has a significant advantage in experience compared to Chavez Jr. He has fought the vastly superior competition against the likes of Paul Williams, Kelly Pavlik, Kermit Cintron, Serhiy Dzinziruk and Darren Baker.

Martinez won all of those bouts in convincing fashion except for a controversial draw with Cintron, a fight he should have won and a contentious loss to Paul Williams which he got revenge in the rematch by knocking out Williams in the second round. Chavez Jr. has defeated Andy Lee, Marco Rubio and Peter Manfredo and dominated these fights; however none of these fighters are on the same level as Martinez`s competition.

Sergio Martinez hoping that win over Chavez Jr. will lead to Mayweather fight

09/14/201608/28/2012 Eddy Pronishev

By Rob Smith: Sergio Martinez (49-2-2, 28 KO’s) has some really big hopes for what a win over WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr (46-0-1, 32 KO’s) will potentially do for him when he meets Chavez Jr. on September 15th in Las Vegas, Nevada. Martinez, 37, sees a victory over the young 26-year-old Chavez Jr. as something that could open doors for him to land a big fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. and if not it could put him on the doorstep to a big money fight.

Martinez said on Max Kellerman’s Face off on HBO to Chavez Jr “After I beat you, I will be nipping on Mayweather’s heals.”

So is Martinez deluded about his aspirations of wanting to get a big money fight against Mayweather? We’ve seen Robert Guerrero talking up a fight with Mayweather recently, and it’s pretty clear that Guerrero has no chances of ever landing that fight unless Mayweather wants decides on taking an easy stay fight. The 37-year-old Martinez could also be kidding himself if he thinks that Mayweather will show any interest in fighting him.

Chavez Jr. will have run out of challenges at 160 lbs if he gets past Sergio Martinez

09/14/201608/25/2012 Eddy Pronishev

By Rob Smith: If WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. is able to get past 37-year-old Sergio Martinez next month on September 15th, Chavez Jr. will have for the most part run out of opponents for him to face. If he chooses to stay at 160 lbs beyond that point in time he’ll likely be limiting himself in terms of important fights that boxing fans to see.

At 6’0″ 180 pounds, Chavez Jr. has the size to compete at super middleweight, light heavyweight and cruiserweight. He’s already too big for the middleweight division, as we’ve seen already with him looking like a hulk next to smaller fighters that look several weight divisions smaller than him. There really won’t be any reason for Chavez Jr. to stay at middleweight once Martinez is out of the way, because all that will be left is guys like Peter Quillin, Felix Sturm, Gennady Golovkin, Daniel Geale and Dimitriy Pirog. Those are fine fighters, but none of them are really well known in the United States except with hardcore boxing fans.

Chavez Jr. really needs to move up to super middleweight after the Martinez fight so that he can take on the top guys in this division. There are a lot of fighters that Chavez Jr. can make good money against, such as Carl Froch, Andre Ward, Mikkel Kessler, Andre Dirrell, Anthony Dirrell, Edwin Rodriguez, Adonis Stevenson and Thomas Oosthuizen. This division is absolutely loaded with talent and it would be interesting to see if Chavez Jr. would succeed at this level.