By James Slater – 27-year-old Timothy Bradley may be on the verge of landing himself the biggest and the best fights of his entire career. Now the holder of the WBC and WBO belts at 140-pounds, Bradley is in line to face WBA champ Amir Khan in a big unification clash; but perhaps more importantly, Bradley is now well and truly on promoter Bob Arum’s radar.
The Top Rank boss spoke to Mike Marley at the weekend, to give his take on the Bradley-Devon Alexander fight, and he also spoke about the possibility of “Desert Storm” one day getting a fight with Manny Pacquiao..
Arum told Marley he feels Bradley is “too tough a guy” for Khan, and that should the two meet in the summer as planned, Bradley will apply too much pressure for Khan to deal with.
“I think Bradley is too tough a guy for Amir, that Khan has nothing to keep Bradley off of him,” Arum said. “Khan has nothing to hurt Bradley, while he’s getting constant pressure.”
Arum’s take on the (hopefully) upcoming fight is interesting, but Khan himself said recently that he would look to counter Bradley’s attacks – most likely with uppercuts to the chin. But Arum knows his stuff when it comes to boxing and he has a pretty good record when it comes to predicting the outcome of a fight correctly. Is Arum right: will Bradley be too tough and too relentless for the 24-year-old Brit?
As for a possible Bradley-Manny Pacquiao fight, Arum said Bradley is the “kind of fighter Manny would welcome.”
“Bradley reminds me of Sugar Shane Mosley,” Arum continued. “Now, some may say Shane’s skills are diminished but he and Bradley always come across as nice guys. There’s no trash talking, any of that nonsense. Bradley’s the kind of fighter we’d love to have. He just comes off nicely as a person and is the kind of opponent I think Manny would welcome; the kind of opponent who is good for the sport of boxing.”
Bradley is certainly growing on the fans, due in large part to his work ethic and his desire to fight the best again and again. The Palm Springs man has for a long time dreamt of a mega-fight with the likes of a Manny Pacquiao or a Floyd Mayweather. Maybe Arum can get him a date with Pac-Man?
Arum, though, feels Saturday’s Bradley-Alexander fight came too soon in the careers of both men.
“They made this fight too soon,” he said. “They should have let it build up another year or so. Watching on TV I felt no electricity, so much so that even the broadcasters did not seem really pumped up. Most of the fans got their tickets for free. It wasn’t a live audience like when you have a good Mexican fighter and fans who are really into the fight.”
To be fair, fans weren’t really into Saturday’s fight because the styles of the two men failed to gel. It was no fault of Bradley’s though, and the immaculately-conditioned fighter tried his best to make it a fight. The audience was disappointingly small (reportedly 4,000) and that didn’t help the atmosphere.
Rest assured, if and when Bradley fights Khan and Pacquiao, the place will be rocking in grand style!