Lomachenko vs Juan M. Marquez

Lomachenko doesn't really fight negatively or spoil. He won't run. Like Pacquiao, he enjoys entertaining the fans and will be coming forward all night playing into Marquez's strengths. It's only a matter of time before Marquez catches him and we all know Marquez is a brutal finisher.

Marquez by KO.

Also, those picking Lomachenko by KO? Seriously? Marquez is one of those un-KO-able guys.

 

It's nice to see that Marquez is still respected enough that someone else might make that point besides myself.

Is it worth pointing out that the Pacquiao who was defeated by Erik was still a developmental version? His right hand hadn't yet evolved into Manila Ice. His overall boxing intellect would mature plenty between 2005 and 2012, also. It's not too hard to argue that Marquez was facing a better version in II, III and IV than Erik had faced in '05 and '06. I don't say that to strip credit from Erik, but more to find fault with this idea that Morales' win over Pacquiao puts Juan to shame.

If we're inviting résumé comparisons beween Marquez and Morales;

Peden, Salido, Juarez, Juan Diaz X2, Katsidis, Pacquiao by KTFO, Alvarado. There's plenty of substance there besides Pacquaio. If we can't add Norwood and John, I'm not sure they represent such a huge loss in the bigger picture of things.

(And I didn't even count Casa, just to slip the inevitable argument that he was shot, even though he'd just overcome the fiery challenge of a strong, young buck in Katsidis after an admittedly rusty and poor showing against Santa Cruz. I probably should've left off Katsidis himself, for that matter. After all, Jorge Linares can get all the credit in the world for beating Kevin Mitchell, while Mick, who took hard fights back-to-back and only ever lost to really good fighters in the small window of his world class prime, gets none for wiping him out in, what, 3 rounds? Because, uh, Mitchell was more focused in 2015, after he'd already spent years urinating his potential up the wall. Or something. Hey, some guys are lucky enough to be fashionable, some aren't. You've either got it or you don't. Talking about "hipsters", if Linares isn't the toast of boxing hipsterdom, I don't know what. We could discuss that guy's résumé, but we need him to look good for, y'know, reasons.)

I'm all for giving Morales a lot of credit for Sanchez, Zaragoza, Poison Jones, Pocket Rocket, Barrera, Kelley, Chi, Ayala, Chavez, Hernandez, Pacquiao, Cano. He has the greater strength in depth in terms of solid B level scalps. But Marquez has enough of that kind of substance in addition to the seismic feat of pursuing the awesome Filipino across multiple weight classes in order to achieve his deliverance by way of devastating, unexpected KO. He isn't exactly a one-hit wonder who did nothing outside of a Hail Mary against a great fighter. He took longer to get there, but he got there and how.

Marquez was on the wrong end of some official scorecards against less than elite competition? Hey, David freaking Diaz, my man. Zahir Raheem. Not exactly A fighters. And if Marquez could at least argue a case for himself with regard to Norwood and John, Erik was soundly beaten by Raheem. I don't like even typing those words, but there it is.

It's also odd that a guy might repeatedly co-sign sympathy for Golovkin when he can't get a decision over Canelo, but slam Marquez for feeling hard done to when he's on the wrong end of controversial decisions against an undefeated Indonesian in Indonesia or an undefeated American in America. Plenty of people outside of Mexico City feel that Marquez won those fights, but he's just a whiner. Another guy might be a saint for not getting decisions and then sitting around moping and waiting for more paydays instead of being constructive and pursuing challenges. It all just depends on, uh, stuff. And, y'know, reasons.

You know when Marquez whined unduly?

• Tim Bradley. Tim beat him clearly, uncontroversially, and Juan was a sore loser. I make no excuse for Marquez when it comes to that 2013 defeat. Marquez was good enough to KO Manny less than a year prior, and Manny is still going and beating top guys as we enter a new decade altogether. I think it's less that Juan was too old for Tim and more that Tim was very good, a high level operator in his own right, albeit a painfully unfashionable one who doesn't get his dues from some quarters. If he wasn't elite, he was certainly borderline or only a hair shy, and I don't bestow the term lightly. He was a fighter who would compromise himself for the sake of bigger opportunites (cf., the Provodnikov bout, a sales presentation which almost backfired), and the results of that have been used, along with his defeats to Manny, as somewhat of a stick to diminish him. Being unable to find a formula to convincingly beat Manny shouldn't be such a stigma, especially given that Tim was able to beat Manny's conqueror. But then, instead of accepting that latter point as evidence of Bradley's high level of competence, some just use it as a stick to beat Juan for losing to a crumby also-ran who got KD'd by Kendall Holt and hurt by Siberian Rocky and Jessie Vargas. Manny was tailor made for Marquez, so giving Pacquiao all kinds of hell over the course of four fights is nothing really to consider, either. We define Marquez by two controversial losses to guys who were sub-A fighters. He is an overrated guy who was just lucky to be a counterpuncher with a right hand, which Manny hates. Or something. I'm getting good at this. When do I get my graduation certificate?

• Pacquiao to an extent. Though, as I said previously, you can kind of appreciate Juan's frustration over the course of three fights. That's why he should be commended for his courageous intellectual gamble, hanging in the jaws of the lion in fight IV, sacrificing stylistic strengths to go against type and go all out for the KO, actively preparing his body to that very end with S&C work designed to maximize the dynamic force he could invest in counterpunches. That KO, by the way, was absolutely the least expected of all plausible outcomes. Pre-fight polls will prove as much. Truth is, it wasn't considered a plausible option by any but a few (most of those few being Mexicans). We forget now that enthusiasm for fight IV was decidedly muted. A lot of boxing fans weren't keen to see it yet again. Fight III hadn't been as entertaining as I and II. I recall stating before the fight that the low expectations could belie a great contest, that it might be the best of the series yet, that anything could potentially happen after three fights, but I'd be lying if I said that I expected to see Manny out cold and flat on his face at the end of it. That's why Juan gets nothing at all but credit from me. The size of the challenge faced and surmounted.

All things considered, KO6 was quite arguably the single greatest victory of that generation of fighters. Marquez basically rewrote Moby D**k. But instead of commending Juan for his amazing achievement, we ask, 'Hey, what took you so long to get smart and knock that lunging putz out?' Or we talk about steroids, as if this hasn't been a dirty sport since the early 1990's at least.


It's comical that picking Marquez to win a fantasy fight leads one to mounting this kind of eleborate defence of his credentials, his manliness and the legitimacy of some of his political angst. But here we are.

Why does it even become necessary? This is the game we play, apparently.


Weirder still that we're talking about strength of résumé in a thread whch concerns Loma. He's eaten up what's been put in front of him (early blip aside), but that menu hardly represents a murderers' row.

 

^ Which speaks also to why I don't see Juan being susceptible to counterpunchers per se. It's true that a guy who can move and potshot at a certain level can convincingly beat him. I was convinced by Floyd and Tim, not so much Norwood and John. But Lomachenko doesn't fight like those guys, anyway.

I don't even think Lomachenko is a counterpuncher in the artisanal sense. He can counterpunch, of course, but, as I noted previously, there's a distinction between a trade counterpuncher, a guy whose forte is counterpunching, and one who can counterpunch.

Lomachenko would be coming to ring center to meet with and engage Marquez plentifully, giving the latter a lot of opportunity to study and read him. He's not going to be playing it cute, in the sense of keeping things long and picking him off, boxing him backing up. He's not going to do the job like a Floyd or a TB did, or even a Norwood or a John, he just doesn't set about his work that way. He has to be able to defeat Marquez on the strength of his offensive and defensive capability at mid-range in center ring, where the meat of the fight will be found in intense, frequent exchanges of fire.

If someone wants me to think again or back away from my pick, I'd need compelling visualization of that action, something to make me reconsider, some idea as to specific maneuvers that Marquez is just incapable of dealing with or adapting to.

I don't think Lomachenko is a dumb fighter, he's capable of outsmarting a Gary Russell, a guy who throws with unvarying speed and relies too heavily on that attribute, but I see a guy like Marquez making Loma look too dependent on aggressive output and being first to the punch. Being a kind of ring academic, he will relish the frequent opportunity to engage and to read his opponent while blocking/parrying and slipping a lot of the fire that comes his way, finding counters up and down with judicious selection and precision (Marquez is a guy who knows how to thread the needle if anyone does, and Loma is not unhittable), working out plays for flush, jolting shots as the bout progresses. He doesn't necessarily land with frequent force enough to take him out, but enough to catch judges' eyes and win a very competitive fight. That's how I see it, until I'm presented with something that makes me feel differently.

I don't think it's terribly unkind to pick against Lomachenko here. I've picked him to win every fight he's been in, including the Salido bout (which I thought he legitimately lost, albeit by an ultimately close margin). I did think Siri would cause him issues, but I figured shopwear would be a factor and that Lomachenko would take over soon enough to win the fight. In reality, not quite. Who knows how Salido was able to keep going back to the well over and over for so long? That man was a marvel.




Marquez vs. Mikey Garcia is a pure counterpuncher vs. pure counterpuncher matchup, incidentally. That's a hypothetical that has been proposed here, and I think Marquez wins that one;

 

Clear Edge to loma, unless dynimita can sucker him in to land the shot Linares did.

 

Couldn't have put it any better myself.. Exactly how I see it... Great post

 

The guy writing the lengthy replies is leaving out the clear fact that Marquez was roided out of his mind for the 4th fight. The evidence is indisputable. When he fought Mayweather he was a doughy fat boy at 140+. When he fought Pacquiao at 140+ he was on Memo Herredia's cocktail of PED's and looked like a mini-hulk with back acne

 

A jacked up JMM slept Pacquiao @ 147 so he can definitely win the fight. It’s not the walk in the park most Loma nut huggers would indicate.

Personally, I am not sure. I’d like to see how Loma fares vs the elite @ 135 before picking the outcome of this one.

 

This isn't Twitter, my friend.

Ahem,

Unlike many, I don't flip-flop on this subject or turn a blind eye when it suits. I'm a realist when it comes to PED use in boxing. It's part of the game now. As in, part of the gameplanning, a strategic factor. If you can find a single instance of me slamming any fighter for popping dirty, I'll concede that I'm full of merda.

Anyone who can't reconcile with the idea of watching anything but truly clean sport shouldn't be watching professional sport in 2020.

 

"The Mexican pharmacy was better..."

-Erik Morales on Marquez-Pacquiao IV


Me, I just don't care. Well, I care in so much as I'd choose a clean sport ideally. But I'm not going to slam one guy for juicing up and come on like I can guarantee my favorites are spotless. It's either accept PEDs or quit watching boxing. I don't care about any other sport, and I hear others are dirty as hell, too. So...

 

While he wasn't at his peak, Casamayor isn't a bad reference for some of the tricks Marquez would use. Between Casamayor and Pacquiao you have examples of him confronting southpaws with classic boxing skill as well as befuddling footwork and raw athleticism. I think Marquez would have a difficult time at first given Loma's speed and control of distance, but at Lightweight, I think Marquez could probably find the mark in mid-rounds and start turning the tides. I think it's close either way, though I think Loma gets dropped before Marquez. Linares is a poor man's Marquez. Loma has very few bad habits but if anyone is to spot them and exploit them, it's Marquez.

 

I don't think he has the power to hurt Marquez and lomas only fought one great but smaller opponent