Unbeaten lightweight contender ‘Frank ‘The Ghost’ Martin was at ringside last Saturday night to call out highly ranked Golden Boy-promoted fighter William Zepeda following his second-round knockout win over Jaime Arboleda at the College Park Center in Arlington, Texas.
Right now, Zepeda looks like a far better talent than Ryan Garcia. The only difference is he doesn’t have the Hollywood movie star looks or the 10 million Instagram followers.
#2 WBA, #6 IBF, #6 WBC & #7 WBO Martin (17-0, 12 KOs) walked up to Zepeda (28-0, 24 KOs) after the fight to let him know that he wanted to fight him next. Martin says he’s fighting in June or July and would like it to be against the undefeated 26-year-old southpaw Zepeda.
It’s unlikely that Golden Boy Promotions will risk putting Zepeda in with Martin right now without a world title on the line and not much money at stake. Golden Boy’s young star Ryan Garcia was destroyed by Gervonta Davis last Saturday, and his career could be heading downhill now that he’s moving up to 140.
Zepeda is the only guy that Golden Boy has that could be transformed into a star, and they’re not going to want to mess that up by putting him in a risky fight against the Errol Spence-promoted Martin.
That’s not to say that Zepeda can’t beat Martin because he’s got the power, work rate, and style to win that fight. Again, it’s a risky fight, and there wouldn’t be a title on the line.
Golden Boy will probably wait until undisputed lightweight champion Devin Haney either vacates his belts or loses them to Gervonta Davis before they let Zepeda take on a serious threat.
“Yeah, after they got out, I asked him if we could dance and we can get the fight going,” said Frank Martin to Jeff Zimmerman when asked if he was scouting William Zepeda last Saturday night for his fight against Jaime Arboleda in Arlington, Texas.
“They said they liked how I approached the situation. So, hopefully, we can get that fight going,” Martin continued about his desire to fight William Zepeda next.
“It was a good performance [against Arboleda]. It was a short performance, and he did what he was supposed to do. He stopped him with a body shot and had him running. So he did what he was supposed to do.
“I’m right there. I’m not ducking nobody,” said Martin when asked how close he is to a world title opportunity. “It ain’t, ‘Let’s get him ready.’ I’m ready for them right now. They won’t give me the opportunity to show what I can do. I’m ready for them right now.
“There’s a lot of fighters that are good right now at 135. You really can’t say until everybody gets in there with each other, and then you can say who is the best.
“I would have frustrated him like he did with Ryan,” said Martin when asked what he would have done if he’d been the one fighting Tank Davis. “I would have boxed his head off and let him come to me.
“I come from the camp of ‘Man Down.’ We put everything down. No, I wasn’t surprised. I knew someone was going to get stopped in the fight,” said Martin when asked if he was ‘surprised’ about Gervonta Davis’ early body shot knockout of Ryan Garcia on April 22nd.
“I just didn’t know who it was going to be, but I knew somebody was going to get stopped. I did an interview prior, and I said it was going to be a stoppage. I thought he [Gervonta] was going to be the one [getting the] stopping, but I honestly felt it could have been either one of them. It was just which one of them landed the big shot first,” said Martin.
