Juan Manuel Marquez Only Focused on Return, Not Vargas Shot

By Miguel Rivera

Last week, Top Rank's CEO Bob Arum was very enthusiastic when BoxingScene.com asked him about the possibility of making a fight between former four division world champion Juan Manuel Marquez (56-7-1, 40KOs) and the newly crowned World Boxing Organization welterweight king Jessie Vargas (27-1, 10KOs).

Arum has discussed the idea of the fight with promoter Fernando Beltran of Zanfer Promotions.

The President of the sanctioning body, Paco Valcárcel, is willing to sanction the contest. Vargas captured the vacant title earlier this month with a knockout victory over Sadam Ali. The belt became vacant when Timothy Bradley dropped the belt in order to fight Manny Pacquiao for a third time on April 9th.

Marquez has been inactive since a May 2014 twelve round decision win over Mike Alvarado. The Mexican veteran has been dealing with a bad knee for the last two years.

Vargas and Marquez has a common opponent in Bradly. Last year, Vargas was outboxed for much of his fight before badly hurting Bradley in the twelfth and final round. The referee accidentally stopped the contest about 10 seconds early after mistakenly believing that he heard the bell. Marquez challenged Bradley for the WBO belt in 2013 and lost a twelve round split decision.

Marquez, 42-years-old, says he is only focused on his comeback fight - which he wants in the summer in Mexico. Once the comeback fight is finalized and done, then he will focus on Vargas or whoever else is next.

"I appreciate the words of Paco Valcarcel [in agreeing to sanction the fight with Vargas], but for now I'm focused on making a [tuneup] fight before thinking of a big fight. Right now I need to train and find out if I will return, otherwise there is no point in discussing [a fight with Vargas]," Marquez told ESPN Deportes.