By Cliff Rold
What do you call a weight division which loses Marco Antonio Barrera, Erik Morales, Joan Guzman, (probably) Juan Manuel Marquez, and Manny Pacquiao all in the span of less than two years?
Less interesting? Sure, in an immediate sense.
Less wealthy? No doubt.
There are other answers as well.
If one is a fan of fresh matches, it might be called intriguing. As great as the fabulous foursome up top has been, against each other and in ignoring the existence of Guzman, there’s always room for new blood.
If one is a fan of Houston, Texas’s Rocky Juarez (27-4, 19 KO), the facelift at 130 lbs. just comes as a relief. Two losses to Barrera in 2007 and a decisive loss to Marquez last fall didn’t bode well for Juarez’s hopes of getting a title fastened around his waist. With the titans aged or grown beyond his reach, he is suddenly in an enviable position most guys with four losses in eight fights rarely get into.
Put plainly, Juarez has lost his way into prime real estate. No he doesn’t have a belt, but he’s got something that can draw beltholders to him. Juarez has name recognition, a tradable commodity in the big business of Boxing. How many other current Jr. Lightweights can say the same? He needs a big win this weekend to make the whole picture come together.
He’s got the sort of opponent on tap this Saturday who can give him one.
Jorge Barrios (47-3-1, 34 KO) is a nightmare in the ring but great for TV. The former WBO titlist from Argentina just doesn’t do bad fights. He first came to prominence in the U.S. in a wild Showtime main event against Acelino Freitas in 2003, dropping the Brazilian icon twice before getting stopped miracle style in the final round. Since then, he’s gone 8-1 with his lone loss coming in a nail biter against Guzman in 2006.
Juarez’s losses haven’t come solely as a result of living legends across the ring. The losses to Barrera and Marquez, as well as his first loss to Mexico’s Humberto Soto in August 2005, all held a similar pattern. Juarez waits…and waits. He too often employs a methodical strategy which would have served him well in days of unlimited rounds brawling but cuts off his chances in the twelve round era.
Barrios won’t let him do that. He comes to fight right away, at close range, and within shooting distance of the Juarez left hook. The punch that made Juarez one to watch on the way up will determine his future this weekend.
He couldn’t have been afforded a better stage for the chance. Not only is he in the featured spot on the undercard of HBO’s best fall non-pay per view fight, Juan Diaz-Michael Katsidis, but he will be in front of a Houston crowd. Juarez-Barrios should have the sort of action that brings the bloodlust out in the paying mob and a violent victory combined with rabid crowd response would make him look like a bigger deal than he might really be right now.
After all, Juarez has had his cracks at the top of the division and failed. His bout with Soto and first shot at Barrera were close; the Barrera rematch and bout with Marquez were not. Most fighters in his position would be working the ESPN circuit right about now. Juarez has advantages others do not.
The biggest current advantage in getting onto Saturday’s card is obvious: he’s promoted by Golden Boy Promotions. Juarez-Barrios was originally intended as a hardcore inducement for purchase back in the Spring of this year on the undercard of the ultimately cancelled Shane Mosley-Zab Judah card. Had the fight happened there, it would have been seen by just enough people to vanish no matter what happened in the ring. When the card fell through, Golden Boy still had a good little fight made and the Diaz-Katsidis date gave them a home for it, meaning literally millions more potential eyes.
Another advantage comes at the foundation of Juarez’s career. Loyal readers might have seen comments in recent weeks from some about how the Olympics don’t matter anymore; about how some fighters just skip them for the pros. Some might do just that but Juarez is proof of how valuable Olympic exposure remains. His 2000 Silver Medal performance put him on Showtime for his pro debut, made him a centerpiece of Main Events NBC afternoon broadcasts a few years back, and allowed him enough notoriety to merit a crack at Barrera less than a year after his first loss. While he’s kept on losing to his best foes, those foes come with such impeccable credentials that he remains an easy sell.
If he can add Barrios to his ledger as a win this weekend, the sell gets easier.
Quick, name the reigning alphabelt titlists at Jr. Lightweight? Off the top of your head…without looking it up.
Stumped?
Exactly.
Even with losses, Juarez has remained front and center in the public eye by taking lumps from some of the game’s best. The crop of prominent Jr. Lightweights viable in the U.S. market (that probably wouldn’t include WBO titlist Alex Arthur or IBF titlist Cassius Baloyi unless they were induced to travel) need someone who can expand their audience.
Soto would probably like another go with Juarez. California’s Robert Guerrero and Mexico’s Jorge Linares in particular have taken the risk of vacating their IBF and WBC featherweight title belts, respectively, in hopes of increasing their net worth four pounds higher and could use the name opponent.
And then of course there is the one titlist out there who American fight fans have ached to see live and who has come close to being licensed in Texas previously despite pre-existing head injuries: WBA titlist Edwin Valero of Venezuela, he of the massive YouTube following and all by knockout 24-0 record.
All of the above could use a little Juarez in their life and certainly in their bank accounts. Juarez could use a win this Saturday to enhance their need and keep his own dreams alive.
And in a fine match, Barrios could give a damn what everyone else could use. He’ll have his own designs. As a total recipe, it leaves Jr. Lightweight captivating even without their most captivating recent figures.
Switching gears…
Moving on from No
Now that Oscar De La Hoya-Manny Pacquiao is signed and set, can everyone else start moving along? On a much, much grander scale than the affects Juarez can have on his realm, De La Hoya brings too much of the world to a standstill every time Boxing goes through one of his ‘who’s next’ moments. The reason is simple.
Everyone within spitting distance wants their Oscar check.
Back in the day, those were fascinating conversations involving names like Quartey, Trinidad, Vargas and Mosley, big money fights where Oscar was taking huge presumed risks.
The calculus has changed.
Now, unless the other name involved is Mayweather, Oscar is looking for similar money in big events with lesser risk. Regardless of whether or not anyone reading thinks Manny Pacquiao can compete, even win, Oscar probably doesn’t and shouldn’t. He’s fighting a guy so much smaller than him naturally that it screams ‘be cynical’ to anyone with more than passing attention to the sport.
Whatever. Good for him. Good for both of them.
Sorry, but if a couple big names nearing their end want to cash out with each other, so what? I’d feel different if we were witnessing two men at their absolute peak with better matches to be made. In at least Oscar’s case, we’re not and Manny probably wasn’t going to face the better Lightweights anyways with Ricky Hatton possible.
Getting to the heart of what antipathy has been expressed towards De La Hoya-Pacquiao, Oscar isn’t going to fight Antonio Margarito, probably ever. Why would he? There is no reason to think that fight is really even close in the ring right now so the only reason for anyone to scream to see it is to see Margarito get paid and/or see Oscar get mauled.
Neither of those is Oscar’s problem and fans who want to see great fights would be better served building the needed anticipation and buzz for Antonio Margarito-Paul Williams II anyways.
Love or loathe him, Oscar has done more than his fair share to elevate the game in his time. Given the overall shrinking of the Boxing audience during his day, Oscar may have more done more relatively than even Sugar Ray Leonard did for Boxing. He’s fought most of the best across multiple weight classes (even if his best weren’t as good as Leonard’s best) and made careers which in turn fed other careers. The list of guys he didn’t fight is shorter than those he did and now it’s time for the rules of his remainder, at age 35 and staring to show it, to be recognized and accepted.
The Weekly Ledger
This isn’t all I had to say this week…here’s the links to the rest of my contributions to your reading pleasure on:
Calderon-Cazares: https://www.boxingscene.com/?m=show&id=15664
The (TV) Week Ahead: https://www.boxingscene.com/?m=show&id=15678
August in Review: https://www.boxingscene.com/?m=show&id=15705
Cliff’s Notes…
Think about it this way: Floyd Mayweather losing $7 a-milli is almost equal to his Margarito duck. Almost…And yes, I giggled when I saw the link on TMZ; the things it takes to get Boxing mainstream never cease to amaze…So Cristian Mijares-Vic Darchinyan might still happen this year but probably happens next year. Got it. Here’s the question: if it goes next year, what’s the road to the winner versus Fernando Montiel? Is there one? With mandatories due on at least three of the four belts in play in the scenario, someone might have to give up some hardware to finish the circle of awesome going on at 115…If Deontay Wilder can become a star at Heavyweight, his new promoters at Golden Boy could become the most powerful force in Boxing since the IBC…Look it up. It could be a good and/or a bad thing…I already miss Wednesday Night Fights.
Cliff Rold is a member of the Ring Magazine Ratings Advisory Panel and the Boxing Writers Association of America. He can be reached at roldboxing@hotmail.com