By Jason Kim: With four losses out of his last eight fights, there’s major questions looming about the career of former light welterweight and welterweight champion Zab Judah (37-6, 25 KOs). While some people consider Judah, 31, to be totally shot, I see it differently. He’s clearly lost a step, that’s for sure, but mostly he never really had the size to compete for long in the welterweight division, and was perhaps only good enough to have limited success at that weight class.
With wins over Cory Spinks and Cosme Rivera, easily the two best wins for Judah at welterweight, he then ran into the ceiling for what he can accomplish with his limited size in losses to Floyd Mayweather Jr., Miguel Cotto, Carlos Baldomir and most recently Joshua Clottey.
There’s certainly no shame in losing to quality fighters like that bunch, but in being defeated by them, it’s a signal that Judah doesn’t have what it takes to be at the very top of the welterweight division. I think he has more than enough talent to compete with them, but what’s holding him back now is his lack of size, in addition to his recent stamina issues.
In hindsight, some would probably say that Judah should have stayed at light welterweight where he captured two titles, the IBF and WBC, and was the second best fighter in the division behind Kostya Tszyu. But if Judah had stayed at light welterweight, he would have missed out on huge paydays against Spinks, Mayweather, Baldomir and Cotto, money that he would have likely never earned as a light welterweight.
In any event, Judah chose to move up and after initially losing to Spinks by a 12-round decision in April 2004, Judah stopped him the next year, taking him out in the 9th round in 2005 to capture the IBF/WBA/WBC welterweight titles.
That was the high point of Judah’s career, as he soon after defeated by Baldomir, Mayweather and Cotto in the following years. By then, if it wasn’t clear to Judah that he was having problems at the welterweight division, then it should have been.
The final blow came in his 9th round technical decision loss to Clottey, for the vacant IBF welterweight title, in August. Like in his fights against both Cotto and Mayweather, Judah started off fast against Clottey, landing well with fast punches and hard combinations in the first two rounds.
However, Clottey began giving Judah problems in the 3rd round on, tagging Judah with power shots, bloodying his nose and hurting him at times. The fight ultimately being stopped due to a cut over Judah’s right eye in the 9th, which was caused by a head butt. The fight then went to the cards, and Clottey was given the decision. However, make no mistake about, Judah was getting beaten in the fight and would have lost if the fight had gone the distance.
At 31, Judah may still have time to capture a title or two in the light welterweight division, but he’s going to have to move quickly. With talented fighters like Timothy Bradley, Junior Witter, Joan Guzman, Devon Alexander, Andreas Kotelnik, Kendall Holt, Demetrius Hopkins, Ricardo Torres and Lamont Peterson in the division, it’s not cut and dried that Judah would have immediate success.
I don’t count Ricky Hatton as among those fighters simply because he’s fighting now on his own agenda, going after mega fights against super stars rather than fighting within the confines of the light welterweight division. I think Judah has the talent to beat some of those fighters, and perhaps all of them if his stamina and skin can hold up, but it would be tough.
Torres punches much harder than Tszyu ever did, and if Judah were to get nailed by him, the outcome would be similar to Judah’s 2nd round TKO loss to Tszyu in 2001. I have serious doubts whether Judah could beat Guzman and Bradley, because they seem to be just too good for Judah.
However, it’s possible. Those fighters would likely have as big a problem as Judah if they were to have ventured into the welterweight division and fought the same fighters that Judah did. Guzman seems too small to do this, as does Bradley.