Can Marquez overcome the "Money" odds?

In Floyd Mayweather’s home away from home within the confines of the bright lights of Las Vegas, the odds aren’t too good for “Dynamita”. But while Vegas boasts an overwhelming favor towards “Money” May, this may as well be the chance to cash in big as a potential upset looms on the horizon. The best part is that not too many care to consider it.
Remember, an upset is just that—so I expect more than a couple readers to already roll their eyes.
I sure hope they weren’t the same fanatics who overlooked Buster Douglas and Evander Holyfield when they fought “Iron” Mike Tyson; or the ones to nay-say Marco Antonio Barrera when he was pitted against the “Prince”, Naseem Hamed; or the energizer bunny himself, Bernard Hopkins, when he schooled Kelly Pavlik to turn back the clock once more.
Regardless of how you look at this great match-up, it’s hard NOT to favor Floyd Jr., but does that mean that we should lose all hope for Juan Manuel Marquez just because of the name of his opponent?
Here are a couple surface points to help you take in the upcoming September bout between boxing’s former kingpin, Floyd Mayweather Jr (39-0 25 ko’s) and Mexico’s hero, Juan Manuel Marquez (50-4-1 37 ko’s), who arguably is the best Mexican fighter of his generation.
First off, I am a solid believer that Mayweather will not risk losing speed in order to attain a great physical advantage meaning that he won’t balloon up or outweigh Marquez by that much more come fight night. As we eliminate the entire “big guy” versus “small guy” situation, this is already a big positive for Marquez.
Secondly, it seems that many of us are forgetting about how much momentum plays a roll in boxing, or any competitive sport for that matter. Floyd’s last three fights were against an old, slow Carlos Baldomir; an old, slow Oscar De la Hoya; and a young but slow, Ricky Hatton, who openly decided to stalk his opponents face first, chin untucked. Then “Money” went on to retire.
Marquez took on the current p4p king, and then jumped up in weight to dismantle Joel Casamayor and Juan Diaz in the LATE rounds.
What I see in these string of bouts is the fact that Mayweather barely got past De la Hoya and his best offense against Hatton was to wait for him to walk in face first, which is a given although it took longer than expected, see Manny Pacquiao. Basically he did what he was supposed to do but in not-so-convincing fashion.
Marquez weathered a Filipino typhoon in the form of Manny Pacquiao (twice might I add) where he fought to a draw and split loss then followed the p4p king up the weight ranks where he was the first man to knock out rugged, former lightweight champion Joel Casamayor, and the young, crisp Juan Diaz.
He is extremely durable. In all of these fights Marquez absorbed every punishing blow, weathered it, and came back strong.
After he was dropped thrice in the opening round in their 2004 bout, Marquez stormed back to steal many of the remaining rounds from Pacquiao to spice up the controversial draw. The case in point would be that if Casamayor/Diaz/Pacquiao (twice) couldn’t deter Marquez, I highly doubt the not-so-offensive-minded Mayweather could stop him either. So with that in mind I admit that Mayweather’s best chances are by decision, not stoppage, although I hope he leaves his bike at home because “Dynamita” will want to engage early.
Another key point is RING RUST and INJURY.
Mayweather has been away from the sport for 2 years now; the game has very much changed. On top of that, he had to reschedule the come-back fight citing a mysterious injury. When we tally in all the family distractions as well, what we get is that all of these factors work against Mayweather. He may be a great athlete, but he is still human so he IS beatable. He can stay in shape all he wants out of the ring, but to keep the sharpness and edge as a prize-fighter, well, that needs to be done within the ropes. And with tune up fights seemingly a tradition of the past, Mayweather truly is testing mighty deep waters after a long vacation from the sport.
Remember, Mayweather was bothered enough by Marquez’s open game plan to attack the body that he felt the urge to respond on twitter:
"Marquez says hes goin after my ribs but theres no weakness in MONEY MAY. Only ribs he'll b diggin n2 will b at Outback after I take him down."
Only time can tell whether Marquez’s Castillo-like plan of attack can penetrate the Mayweather shoulder roll.
When we compare boxing IQ/Defense/Arsenal, I cannot say that Mayweather would blow Marquez out of the water in any/all of these areas. If anything, we would have to give the credit to the tactician role that Marquez has taken the identity of. He has power with both hands and can scrap with the best of boxers and brawlers. Everyone, fans and fighters alike, favor the heart of a warrior. When Pacquiao was in the process of stopping Erik Morales in their second meeting, you can clearly see Floyd Jr., as a fan, atop a chair in the front row cheering on the Filipino bomber and current holder of the mythical pound-for-pound title. Subsequent media interviews show Mayweather as saying that “Pacquiao is too small for me.” If this holds true, then wouldn’t Marquez be in the same boat?
The edge goes to Mayweather in the defense department, but with IQ and arsenal, Marquez can and will hold his own come fight night.
Besides-- just like the many who are out there that thought JMM won one of the fights versus Manny Pacquiao, many also believed that Jose Luis Castillo did enough to steal one victory away from Floyd Mayweather Jr. as well. Marquez will be 36 years old in a little over a week. If he is past his prime, we won’t know until September 19th. One things for sure though, Floyd, turning 32 earlier this year, doesn’t look like the youthful former Olympian that we saw a couple years ago. Sporting a couple tears, he left the game claiming that he “does not have the passion to fight” anymore. I sure hope that he never lost it or else it will be another page in the book of upsets.
With the match a little over a month away we still have plenty of time to see how training unfolds. Although the media frenzy hasn’t been as abundant this time around, I, for one, am still looking forward to Number One vs Numero Uno. The winner will get a crack at the Pacman (presuming he wins in November).

Source: http://www.diamondboxing.com/newsstory.php?list=9097