If Khan Beats Kotelnik, How Will Amir Be Shielded From Big Punchers?
May 27th, 2009
By Chris Williams: An often overlooked point about Amir Khan’s fight with WBA light welterweight champion Andriy Kotelnik (31-2-1, 13 KOs) is what precisely will the 22-year-old Khan do should he beat Kotelnik and capture his WBA title.
Now I have a good feeling that Khan will be able to beat Kotelnik in their June 27th bout at the O2 Arena, in Greenwich, London. Kotelnik has little power and likes to throw a lot of jabs and weak single shots. He’s by no means a power puncher, and this obviously is something that attracted Khan and his management to go after this fight.
I guess you call it cherry-picking for an opponent. However, if Khan is able to beat Kotelnik, I’m wondering what Amir plans on doing with his belt. Strangely enough, I can see Khan pulling a Riddick Bowe and throwing the WBA belt in the garbage rather than having to defend it against dangerous punchers like Victor Ortiz, Marcus Maidana and Nate Campbell.
Those are all fighters with a lot of knockout power, and I don’t have a lot of confidence that Khan would be able to beat any of them even with the great Freddie Roach coming up with the best laid plans to beat them.
Those aren’t the types of fighters that would be foiled with a pesky right or left hook from Khan, so if that’s Roach’s scheme to beat those fighters than he’s going to need to go back to the drawing board and come up with something much better than that to get those guys off Khan.
Offensively, I doubt there is a tactic that Khan can fall back on that would work against them. I guess Khan could jab a lot, and maybe run like mad all around the ring trying to keep from getting rocked. But I swear to you, if Khan tries a Manny Pacquiao move by throwing hooks, Amir will get knocked out for sure. And with the knockout, Roach’s new ‘genius’ tag will take a major hit in the process.
Roach is a genius when it comes to Pacquiao, because he does it all with his athletic ability and talent. Roach won’t be able to duplicate the same results with Khan no matter what strategy that Freddie can come up with. I think running is about all Khan can do, but that won’t win him the fight.
This is why I wonder if Amir will ever choose to defend the title. Of all the champions in the lightweight and light welterweight division, Khan and his team chose the weakest of the lot in picking out Kotelnik. It wasn’t something that exactly endeared Khan to his fans, because they could see what I could see.
Khan was looking to get an easy title. He’s got it, but if he wins the belt, everything immediately will get much more difficult for Khan. Khan has put off facing big punchers in his four year career, facing only one – Breidis Prescott – and getting knocked out by him.
However, once Khan gets the WBA title, Khan can no longer be shielded from the big punchers. Sure, Khan can make his non-mandatory title defenses as easy as possible like most fighters typically do, but when it comes to his mandatory title defenses, Khan will be in big trouble.
Tags: 7 Responses to “If Khan Beats Kotelnik, How Will Amir Be Shielded From Big Punchers?”
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did you not know that universum’s owner,Peter Khol is retireing and got big fights for kotelnik,dzindziruk,and sidorenko all within 2 months of each other?.dzindziruk will be fighting on American soil(another underated fighter) for the first time against j. kirkland.khol is doing the best for himself and his fighters.Kotelnik should win this ,unless the victim of another bad decision in england.khan has shown a huge weakness and unless he fights for 12 rounds has no chance.kotelnik beat maidana and choose ortiz to fight before this chance to make andriy alot more money. british propaganda at its best!!!
he beat Barrera cuz barrera was cut accidently in round 1 and couldnt see. Im not saying Khan wouldnt have won , but dont use it as a bench mark for judging him against other fighters, the fight should have been a no contest.
Barrera said Khan can’t punch, and I have to agree. He has lightening fast hands but he hasnt got the power to take someone out with one shot. All the greats have that 1 punch power, Khan is not and will not be great. Hes a 7/10 fighter everyday of the week
Khan will easily dispatch Kotelnik and whereas Ortiz would be a tough fight for him, his far superior handspeed will just blow Nate Campbell out of the water!
Just look at what those hands did to the legend that is Barrera! Funny how a fighter is always washed up when he is beaten by someone these days. Ha
Roach is a great trainer, but when you got Pacman as a student , the talent only needs a tune up. No trainer can do anything with Khan cuz at the level hes moving into, he will get tagged lots of times in the fights, unfortunetly for khan his days are numbered, he’ll beat Kotelnik, become a world champion and be out of the game inside 3 fights.
Having alrerady made his fortune and fame tho, he’s made for life
If he wins this belt, victor ortiz and nate campbell will be gunning for khan bigtime
‘He’s by no means a power puncher, and this obviously is something that attracted Khan and his management to go after this fight.’
Kotelniks camp picked Khan for the fight, not the other way around.
Not cherry-picking if the fight is offered to you, good article otherwise though.
some good points, but fail to look at how abysmal his defense was and the way he used to set up power punches – which was leading with hooks and flurrys sqaured up and his chin in the air – even against MAB he made some defensive mistakes but is becoming more of a complete boxer and you shall see down the stetch of his carrer if he stays with Freddie, that he will be able to beat power punches