Photo courtesy of Matchroom Boxing

He’s been called the worst heavyweight champion in the history of the sport. Those not-so-kind words follow Charles Martin as he plots his next move following his humbling second-round knockout loss to Anthony Joshua on April 9 in London.

According to Martin’s manager, Mike Borao, the 6-5 heavyweight is heading to training camp on Aug. 1 and has designs of returning to the spotlight in the fall. It’s the first step in the process of rebuilding Martin’s once-thriving career following his let-down against Joshua. “Mentally, he wasn’t there,” said Boroa of the loss. Martin didn’t put up much of a fight in defending his IBF title, which he held for barely three months.

“He may or may not do a tune-up fight at the end of September,” Borao told RingTV.com on Thursday following a press conference in Manhattan for Leo Santa Cruz’s title fight against Carl Frampton Saturday on Showtime. “And then a Top-15 opponent in November or December? And then hopefully another big shot in the first or second quarter of next year.”

There are no dates lined up. Martin (23-1-1, 21 knockouts) had a chance to return on the undercard of Deontay Wilder’s title defense against Chris Arreola earlier in the month but passed on the opportunity to give Martin more time to rest after a hectic start to his career, Borao said.

Martin had been targeting Arreola to come back against but he got the title shot against Wilder instead. Boroa hopes to line up a return bout for Martin against someone like a Gerald Washington, Dominic Breazeale, Travis Kauffman or Eric Molina, he said.

Since turning pro in October of 2012, Martin has fought no less than three times a year, including a whopping 11 fights in 2013. “He was a little burned out,” Borao said. “I think you saw it in the Joshua fight. Maybe we should have spaced out that fight a little more because he just won a title and then to fight Joshua seven weeks later — but now we have a chance to go back to retool and fix the mistakes and then to come back better than before.”