Diaz: Khan can’t take a punch and he panics when he gets hit

By Boxing News - 02/26/2013 - Comments

khan9By Scott Gilfoid: Former IBF lightweight champion Julio Diaz (40-7-1, 29 KO’s) has already figured out how to beat Amir Khan (27-3, 19 KO’s) in their catchweight right on April 20th in the UK. Diaz sees Khan’s lack of a chin and his tendency for panic as an avenue for beating the struggling ex-light welterweight champion.

The 33-year-old Diaz said to thesun.co.uk “There are a lot of weaknesses [in Khan’s game]. He can’t take a punch and when he gets overwhelmed he tends to panic too much. I aim to make it a brawl…It will be a real fight.”

Diaz fights at welterweight now and will have to come down to 143 lb. in order to make the catchweight that Khan wants. Whether that will weaken Diaz or not remains to be seen. I suspect it’ll hurt him a little, but he’s already up against it in this fight because he’s not had a real challenge in quite some time.

Diaz seems to understand that he’s going to have to get to Khan early by brawling him if he’s going to have any kind of chance of winning the fight. Diaz can be taken out early himself as we saw in 3rd round knockout loss to Kendall Holt.

Diaz was picked out because none of the welterweights that Golden Boy Promotions tried to get for the fight were willing to fight at a strength draining catchweight. Diaz obviously wants the payday and is willing to drain down for the fight.

This is Diaz’s big chance to get back in the thick of things. If he can knockout Khan then it could open some doors for bigger fights, and possibly even a rematch against Khan that would give him a bigger payday. Khan never attempted to avenge his 1st round knockout loss to slugger Breidis Prescott, but I think he might be favorable to fighting Diaz again if he loses to him.

Khan would pretty much have no other choice but to fight him again because he can’t keep moving on each time he gets beaten. Lamont Peterson and Danny Garcia both beat Khan, and Khan still hasn’t fought either of them to try and avenge his losses.

Diaz has the technique and the ring smarts to KO Khan, but he’s got to go after the Brit early in the fight to try and catch him with something big. Khan always starts his fights fighting wildly without thinking, and Diaz should be able to take advantage of Khan’s over aggression.



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