Middleweight champion Sergio ?Maravilla? Martinez (46-2-2, 25 KOs) and undefeated junior middleweight champion Sergiy Dzinziruk (37-0, 23 KOs) meet Saturday at Foxwoods Resort Casino in Mashantucket, Connecticut for the vacant WBC Diamond middleweight belt. Dzinziruk has been mentioned for a few years as a potential opponent for ?Maravilla.?
?That?s true,? said Sergio. ?Since he was in Germany around 2006, 2007 I wanted to fight him but we were never able to come to an agreement with Universum and the fight didn?t happen. After that I fought Sa?l Rom?n in a WBC eliminator for the 154lbs belt and I took a different path to the one he was taking. I would have beaten him then and I will beat him now. He is a cold boxer, lineal, typically Eastern European. I hope he?s ready to put on a good show. But whatever he does he won?t have even the slightest chance to beat me.?
How are you feeling, you?re in the final stage of training right?
I?m better than ever, which I always say but might not necessarily be 100% true. I?m fast, strong, alive, experienced and I believe in myself. A combination of many factors are helping me enjoy the greatest moments of my sporting life.
And after Dzinziruk?
Well, as usual, I?ll rest a few days, have some meetings and wait to see what comes. It?s the part that I like the least but it?s necessary.
Many names have been mentioned as a potential rival for you. Cotto, Margarito, Chavez Jr, Mayweather, Pacquiao?it wouldn?t be a bad thing it came in that order.
It?s all very difficult. Over here there are rumors, people speak, people negotiate but I don?t know. One day it seems that I?m going to fight with Cotto, another day it?s Chavez, another day it?s nobody. I don?t know, it?s hard to understand, what I can guarantee is that of all these potential rivals that you mentioned, they only have to give me a date, a time and a place and I will be there. I?ll just try to avoid the Klitschko brothers unless we can come to a good agreement (laughs).
One thing is clear, you don?t lack confidence.
Of course, I?m in the form of my life in every respect and I want to show it fight after fight. I want to give a good show which is something the public demands. I will knockout Dzinziruk and I just hope my rivals don?t run away from me so I can show in 2011 that I am the best pound for pound fighter.
Should we consider ?Maravilla? a permanent fixture at 160lbs?
We can say so yes. This weight class has been great for me. Since the last bout with Paul Williams, I can say that I am totally at home in this weight class.
But from what we have seen you don?t have any trouble in making a specific weight.
It?s like anything. If it is for the right fight I could give up a bit of weight. It happened in the last fight in November when I had to make 158lbs. I don?t have any problems around that kind of weight, between 155-160lbs. In accepting the catchweight with Paul Williams at 158lbs, I also wanted to send out a message that no opponent will unnerve me by trying to make me lose 3 or 4 pounds. The honest thing to do would be to fight at the limits that the weight categories are set for, but you know, business is business.
We understand that with Dzinziruk there is no catchweight, but this could be the case for other opponents.
That?s right. This fight is at the middleweight limit. If we speak with Pacquiao, Mayweather or Cotto, well that?s another story. There are other interests besides weight and titles.
Perhaps we have got to the point of your career where the most important thing are the names and TV audiences are more important than titles?
Indeed. What?s important is that HBO show my fights and they have to be appealing to the fans and attract a large amount of television viewers. It?s obvious that a Maravilla Martinez vs Miguel Cotto is a lot more attractive that a Martinez vs Sylvester even if there are titles on the line.
Recently Felix Sturm declared that he would have to beat Sergio Martinez to consider himself the world champion. What do you think about that?
That?s what Sturm says and everyone tells me that in the street. You just have to see my last 3 fights and the last 3 of Sturm or Sylvester o Zbik, and those guys are the regular champions. I think the fans are the ones who know more about all this. In any case, I think a fight with Sturm would be great, but at the moment they don?t want it, I?m too strong.
We honestly think that Chavez Jr on the other hand, as has been speculated, would not get in the ring with you until you have celebrated your 45th birthday.
At 45 I hope to be resting. I won?t say anything, just that deep inside me, I would never feel like a world champion if I were to say no to a rival in my division. We can blame managers, promoters, television people or whoever, but I couldn?t sleep feeling like a world champion if I didn?t fight with someone just out of fear of losing.
In the end, life and time has put you in a privileged position.
You guys who know me well know the struggle that I have been through to get to this point and from here only two things could destabilize me. A lack of motivation or age and at the moment those 2 factors don?t affect me at all, as I feel young and at the same time experienced and I feel that I still have a world to conquer. The message that Dzinziruk has to have is that he has to do something epic to beat me as from here on I could only lose if someone killed me.
What do you think of your old belt from the WBC at 160lbs being contested by Zbik and Chavez Jr?
I won?t say that Chavez Jr or Zbik don?t deserve to fight for that title, but they should have been challenging me. I already mentioned to you that there are too many other interests and that sometimes decisions that go against you can also benefit you. It?s not in your hands, it just forms a part of the business known as boxing and basically what I think doesn?t mean too much. On the other hand, I?ve always been a WBC boxer and I will be for a long time, even in things beyond pure sporting terms.
A prediction for 2011? What do you want from it?
To beat Dzinziruk and that Pacquiao and Mayweather give me the chance to fight for the pound for pound title against them and to be the fighter of the year again.
A prediction for the 12th of March?
Without doubt a win for Martinez inside the distance in the final third of the bout.
A prediction for what is to come in your sporting life?
I will retire from boxing being the best pound for pound fighter in the world.
Would you like to add anything else?
Yes, that I never, ever ever forget about my family, or about Quilmes or about Argentina. I fight for them. I can?t wait to go back to my country and back to Spain as well as they are places where my achievements please my people even more than they please me.
