By Dan Ambrose: In questionable move by the World Boxing Council, they’ve reportedly gave WBC light welterweight champion Danny Garcia permission to face IBF 140 pound champion Lamont Peterson on April 11th without the WBC 140 pound Lamont Peterson in a catch-weight fight at 143 pounds without either of their titles being on the line, according to Dan Rafael of ESPN.
It’s unclear why the WBC isn’t stripping Garcia of his title, given that this is his second consecutive fight where he’s not faced his mandatory or even an optional contender in the 140 pound opponent.
Instead of defending his title against a contender who has been waiting for a long, long time for a title shot, Garcia gets to fight Peterson in a bout where he stands to lose nothing even if he gets beaten.
Garcia gets to keep his WBA and WBC 140 pound titles even if he loses due to it being a catch-weight fight over the light welterweight limit at 143. In this case, the WBC is doing Garcia a big favor in letting him bypass the top #1 WBC contender Viktor Postol in what would have been a difficult fight for Garcia.
Postol was reportedly given a step aside fee in order for Garcia to take the fight against Lamont Peterson, who was recently knocked out in just 3 rounds by Lucas Matthysse in 2013.
Why Garcia is fighting Peterson instead of Matthysse or Mauricio Herrera is unclear. It just looks like Garcia is taking another safe fight similar to his bout against 2nd tier lightweight Rod Salka last year in their catch-weight fight at 143 pounds.
The good news for boxing fans is that this is likely Garcia’s last fight at light welterweight, as he’s expected to move up to the welterweight division to campaign as a 147 pound contender. However, you can bet that Garcia will quickly move back down to the light welterweight division once he tastes defeat once or twice against the top fighters in this division.
Garcia was able to dominate his frequently lighter opponents at light welterweight, but in moving up in weight to the 147 pound division, Garcia will quickly find out that he doesn’t have a huge weight advantage over his opponents in this weight class.
Garcia will then need to depend on his power and whatever tricks he has to beat these guys because he won’t be able to do it on size.
Postol could be fighting on the Garcia vs. Peterson undercard on 4/11, says Rafael. If Garcia does choose to vacate his WBC title, Postol will then face Matthysse for the vacant WBA 140 pound title, which is a good thing.
If Garcia does choose to hold onto his WBC title, then he’ll have to fight Postol next. The WBC won’t let Garcia take a third consecutive catch-weight fight above the light welterweight limit of 140, and they won’t let him give Postol another step aside feel in order to bypass that fight.
Some boxing fans think that Garcia has made a mockery of the WBC light welterweight belt by him being able to fight at catch-weights above the limit again and again without him having to face an actual contender.
What makes things even worse is that Garcia fought an unranked lightweight in his last fight in a catch-weight at 143 pounds when he fought little Rod Salka, who looked tiny compared to Garcia in the ring.
The WBC says they will donate the sanctioning fees for the Garcia-Peterson fight to charity, according to Rafael.
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