By Gav Duthie: I understand this is a minority opinion but I think Amir Khan is one of the few boxers that has the potential to defeat Floyd Mayweather Jr. Make no mistake I think he is a talented fighter with incredible attributes but this is not an Amir Khan love piece its more about how he is wasting a promising career.
Amir keeps making the same mistakes both in and out of the ring which is greatly effecting his fighting potential. He may have the fastest hands in boxing but from a ring IQ and marketing point of view he is a complete disaster.
I think he is once again in danger of blowing a fight with Floyd Mayweather if he decides to fight Josesito Lopez in December but Amir and his team continues to keep making the same errors in the ring exposing his chin and his choices of when and who to fight out of the ring.
Admiration
I actually quite admired how Amir came back from his loss to Breidas Prescott. There were already question marks over his chin at domestic level after knockdowns against Michael Gomez and Willie Limond, Prescott’s 40 second knockout confirmed it. Many of our British fighters have went into their shell after a big loss (Kevin Mitchell v Katsidis, Naseem Hamed v Barrera) but he got straight back on it. He said he would be back in the gym and he was, he quickly beat Oisin Fagan and then Frank Warren put him straight in with Barrera. Amir Khan was a world champion within the year.
Never Learns
I thought that he had matured from that experience but I was clearly wrong. He had never really learned anything its just that he carries on with the same distorted view of himself regardless of his experiences.
(1) Marcos Maidana
After watching the Maidana fight in the 1st round v Khan I thought it would be an easy night for Amir. Khan’s problem was trying to show everyone how great his CHIN was rather than accept the obvious. He scraped the decision but was nearly knocked out in the process. Clever boxers like Wladimir Klitschko’s strength was accepting his weaknesses and fighting a different way, Amir Khan is too stubborn and at this point he was a ticking time bomb despite gaining a decent fan base with exciting performances.
(2) Lamont Peterson
He had looked great against Judah but a prime Peterson was a different test. Once again the first round was a carbon copy of the Maidana fight with Khan dropping him. From then on Amir let Peterson fight his fight on the inside. Khan had decent flurries and it was back and forth and a great fight but I had no arguments with the decision. Rather than accept he fought the wrong style he tried to create a ‘JFK’ type second gunman on the grassy knowle conspiracy. He claimed there was judge tampering and the referee was also bias. The fact is he looked past Breidas Prescott and he also looked past Lamont Peterson.
I remember Khan co-commentating on Pacquiao-Marquez 3. He clearly thought Marquez had won and said he would fight him, this was before he was due to fight Peterson. He has never learned from his suspect chin or from overlooking opponents and he continues to do this.
(3) Danny Garcia
Amir actually was boxing quite well early on with Garcia finding it difficult to cope with the speed. However as per usual Khan came in with the low right hand and his chin hanging out. It was all over with one left hook. What was more worrying was that he nearly lost to ex-Lightweight champion Julio Diaz with the same left hook which he landed well and often even with a change of trainer from Freddie Roach to Virgil Hunter.
(4) Inactivity
We all know Khan basically threw away the chance to beat Mayweather because he passed on the chance to fight Devon Alexander in December 2013. Had he won that fight he would have been a world champion and the Mayweather fight would have made itself. Floyd is all about fight marketability and with Madana beating Broner it took him right up to the top of the queue.
Once again Amir will be looking to secure a fight with Floyd Mayweather in May. The American has confirmed that he will fight his last two fights in 2015, May then September. Knowing Floyd this may change but at the moment we need to take what he says at face value. This means Amir is now competing with Kell Brook, Keith Thurman, Danny Garcia, Manny Pacquiao and Kell Brook among others for two fight spaces.
A fight with Josesito Lopez isn’t going to cut it
If he decides to fight Lopez over Devon Alexander and Robert Guerrero he can forget fighting Floyd. Lopez is decent at a certain level but even in his biggest win over Victor Ortiz was due to luck with the broken jaw and Ortiz lack of heart. He has since been stopped by Canelo and Maidana so why would Amir Khan be looking to fight him. In my opinion this is just a stay active fight which is almost as bad as not fighting at all. He needs to keep his name at the top for Mayweather to justify the fight.
Kell Brook
Perhaps Khan is looking more at a fight with Sheffield star Kell Brook instead and with Kell’s stabbing he won’t be ready until the new year. A fight with Lopez wouldn’t effect this fight as casual UK fans wouldn’t generally know the difference between Lopez and say Alexander as long as Khan wins.
Conclusion
Amir has decided to not avenge any of his defeats against Prescott, Peterson or Garcia. He is always one big punch away from another defeat but a win over Mayweather would wipe the slate clean. Styles make fights and although I think Mayweather is fantastic and Khan is above average at best I feel that with Khans speed he can cause Floyd problems at 37. This is the fight that he needs to go for but he needs to take a risk to get it. If he doesn’t think he can beat the likes of Alexander and Guerrero then he shouldn’t bother naming Mayweather as a potential opponent ever again.
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