Marquez legitimizes Bradley kingship

JUAN Manuel Marquez’s trainer Nacho Beristain did not waste time to slur world welterweight titlist Tim Bradley as the “only unbeaten world boxing champion with two losses.”

Himself speaking, Marquez, 40, said he got cheated again, as in the three times he had to cry robbery after being declared loser on points against Manny Pacquiao.

“I came to win and I felt that I did win,” Marquez cried.

Two of three judges who worked the WBO welterweight championship Saturday night in Las Vegas saw Bradley, 30,  the winner.

A third judge voted for Marquez, thus making it a split verdict in favor of the underrated Bradley.

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Beristain’s protestation was loud enough to be heard around the world,

But unlike in other previous cries, this last one sounded both hollow and invalid.

It’s like this:  Marquez obviously felt he had fought hard and done enough to be declared winner.

Marquez may have not appeared like a loser to the lone dissenting judge and other partisan spectators.

Bradley, however, won it with a display of splendid footwork, superior quickness and better ring control.

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Bradley did not wield a vaunted knockout punch, but he was the superior  craftsman in a match Marquez had desperately (and blindly?) tried to win by stoppage.

Clearly, Marquez, the sly fox, got outfoxed in his own turf.

Bradley played it cleverly by refusing  early offers for a slugfest.

At the same time, Bradley  brought the bout to a truly technical, if not very sensational, level.

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Anyway, when Bradley got roundly booed by the pro-Mexican ringside crowd, the American was reported to have taunted the hecklers to make it louder.

He was not only flashing honest confidence at how he had outpointed, if not totally vanquished, Mexico’s hottest boxing property.

Bradley, in winning, thus prevented Marquez from making it as the only Mexican ring warrior to capture world crowns in five separate divisions.

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Not only that.

A win over Bradley would’ve readily confirmed and crowned Marquez the greatest Mexican boxer of all time.

Ironically, Marquez’s  failure has also resulted in the timely legitimacy of Bradley’s reign in the world welterweight kingdom.

The crown on Bradley’s head had previously appeared bogus, his reign suspect, after that disputed, dismal decision he had scored over Manny Pacquiao last June.

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(DECADENT:  Not a few local boxing devotees readily noticed the sudden deterioration of Juan Manuel Marquez in the bout against Tim Bradley. There were those who felt he had suddenly aged. Others decried the absence of the muscle bulk he had  when he stopped and conquered Manny Pacquiao.   “The word is decadent,”  quipped music connoiseur Francis Serrano during his birthday dinner in Kamuning on Sunday evening.  Lawyer Serrano’s way of suggesting Marquez must’ve all the while sat on his laurels after that magnificent conquest of Pacquiao.)