By Eric Thomas: According to the latest boxing news, referee Joe Cortez will be working this Saturday’s championshio fight between WBA light welterweight champion Amir Khan (23-1, 17 KO’s) and Marcos Maidana (29-1, 27 KO’s) at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, in Las Vegas, Nevada. For those not familiar with Cortez, he’s the same referee that worked the Ricky Hatton vs. Floyd Mayweather Jr. bout in 2007. In that fight, Hatton was unable to work on the inside because Cortez kept separating him and Mayweather, which pretty much forced Hatton to fight on the outside where he got dominated.

You have to see Cortez working the Khan-Maidana fight as a move that benefits Khan greatly, because a lot of what Maidana does is on the inside in close. If he’s unable to fight on the inside without having Cortez jump in to separate, warn or penalize Maidana, this could change the whole flow of the bout and make it a lot easier for Khan to win. Ideally, Cortez will just let the two fight out of a clinch if it comes to that, but in the Mayweather-Hatton fight, Cortez didn’t wait very long before separating Hatton from Mayweather. Additionally, Cortez won’t tolerate any rabbit punches from Maidana and will likely stop to warn or take points from him. This is fine as long as it’s not done while Maidana is in the process of finishing Khan off. I could just see this giving Khan time to survive after having been hurt by one of Maidana’s right hands.

My worry for Maidana is that Cortez could pull the plug on the fight and disqualify him if he were to land a questionable low blow or rabbit punch. In the Humberto Soto vs. Francisco Lorenzo bout in June 2008, Cortez disqualified Soto for landing a grazing head shot after Lorenzo had gone done. Hopefully, Cortez doesn’t insert himself in the Maidana-Khan fight and make it difficult for Maidana to fight without constant interupptions of the action, warnings and penalizations. I think think Cortez working the fight really helps Khan a lot in this fight.