By Rey Colon

Jonathan Oquendo (23-3, 16 KO's) is not going forward with a planned fight on October 12 in Las Vegas, Nevada, with two-time Olympic gold medalist, Vasyl Lomachenko, who will be making his professional debut. The Puerto Rican boxer says his left hand is injured and the money being offered was very low. The match was slated to be part of the Timothy Bradly-Juan Manuel Marquez HBO Pay-Per-View from the Thomas & Mack Center.

"I will not [go forward] for two reasons. First, I have an injury to one of my knuckles on the left hand and I've lost a couple of weeks of my training. Besides, the economic part is not the best. I did not like it. For that kind of  the money a monkey would dance. He had everything against me. I would have to win by knockout because they were going to give the decision to him. I was going in there as a stepping stone. The kid may be a little star but not invincible," Oquendo said.

Oquendo said he learned from his mistake against Wilfredo 'Papito' Vazquez, the former WBO super bantamweight champion, when he went forward without proper training.

"I knew I did not have the proper training. I accepted the fight and lost. From this I learned a lot. If I'm not ready physically, I will not fight. If I learned anything from the fight with Vazquez, when something affects you in training then you should not be taking a fight," Oquendo said.