By Jason Kim: 35-year-old WBC light welterweight champion Erik Morales (52-7, 36 KO’s) was almost beaten for his second consecutive fight against little known fringe contender Pablo Cesar Cano (22-1, 17 KO’s) in a 10th round stoppage to claim the vacant World Boxing Council light welterweight strap last September.

Morales will now be defending his title for the first time against #3 WBC ranked contender Danny Garcia (22-0, 14 KO’s) on March 24th in a still to be determined venue in Houston, Texas. Morales was hoping to get big fights against the likes of Juan Manuel Marquez and Manny Pacquiao, but he’s been pretty much ignored by both of them.

The problem is Morales isn’t considered the top guy at 140, and you can say he’s little more than a paper champion at this point. He was beaten by Marcos Maidana last April in a fight he deserved to lose and then looked terrible against 22-year-old Cano. The big fights aren’t likely to come for Morales; hence he’s defending his title against the little known 23-year-old Garcia instead of facing one of the big stars for a money fight.

As much as I like Morales as a fighter for what he was in the past, I think he’s going to lose soundly to Garcia in March and there is probably not much Morales can do to change all that. He recently had gallbladder surgery and that’s effectively pushed the Garcia fight into March, but it’s probably not going to change a thing.

Garcia has the height, speed, power, reach and youth going for him in this fight. Morales has the experience and the technical ability going for him but that’s not going to be enough. Garcia will win this fight based on size and youth alone. He’s a good fighter and will probably give Morales a pretty bad beating in taking his WBC title.

Not sure where Morales can from here once he loses. Maybe he could move down in weight if he can take off some of the flab he’s carrying around on his sides but I doubt it. He’s fighting at light welterweight because it leaves him weakened when he tries to fight at 135.