Khan says Pacquiao fight would be “amazing”

By Boxing News - 11/03/2015 - Comments

khan200By Scott Gilfoid: It’s still up in the air right now whether Amir Khan (31-3, 19 KOs) and Manny Pacquiao (57-6-2, 38 KOs) will do battle on April 9th next year or not. Khan, who is about to turn 29-years-old next month, badly wants the Pacquiao fight to happen.

Khan says the negotiations are still taking place, and he’s hoping that he’ll be the next guy that the soon to be 37-year-old Pacquiao faces next year. Khan has a lot of competition in trying to land the Pacquiao fight. Bob Arum of Top Rank is keen on setting Pacquiao up with his unbeaten fighter WBO light welterweight champion Terence Crawford (27-0, 19 KOs) in April.

I have a feeling that Khan’s visions of him fighting Pacquiao are little more than a sad pipe dream that won’t ever become a reality. I just don’t see it happening for him.

Arum also is interested in potentially putting WBO welterweight champion Tim Bradley back in with Pacquiao for a third fight if Bradley defeats Brandon Rios this Saturday night on November 7th in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Arum wants to see what happens in that fight before he and Pacquiao make their decision about who the guy will be in the ring with him on 4/9 next year.

“It would be an amazing fight, two fighters who know each other really well,” Khan said to timesofindia.indiatimes.com. “My office arranges the fights for me. If the fight happens, it would be an amazing fight, it would be a big fight.”

I wouldn’t go so far as to say a Pacquiao-Khan fight would be “an amazing fight,” as Khan seems to think it will be. I do think it’ll be an interesting spectacle. I think it’ll end badly for Khan with him getting trounced by Pacquiao and needing to be scooped up off the canvas. For Pacquiao, it’ll be a nice way to end his career by scoring a spectacular knockout.

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Goodness knows, it’s been ages since Pacquiao last knocked someone out. We’re talking six years since Pacquiao’s last knockout in 2009, when he stopped Miguel Cotto in the 12th round. Depending on who you talk to, Pacquiao’s absence of knockouts is because he’s too nice now, or he simply has aged and lost his explosive punching power.

I think even if Pacquiao does want to take it easy on Khan for fear of hurting him, I still see him blasting him out in six rounds or less. I can’t see Khan making it past the 6th round with Pacquiao in April. Khan can try every trick in the book to go the full distance, but I still don’t see him being able to make it to the 12th round against Pacquiao.

The holding, head-locks, shoving and running that Khan does from time to time in his fights won’t help him against Pacquiao. I see it ending badly for Khan. But the positive from this fight would be Khan finally getting a big cash out fight to where he won’t need to face anyone good for the rest of his career if he doesn’t want to. I mean, the cash that he’ll be getting for the Pacquiao fight will be enough for him to survive on for the remainder of his life unless he spends it all away. Khan likes to frequently travel from here to there, but I still don’t think his travels would eat up the money he’ll make against Pacquiao.

“We have trained together, sparred together and obviously I have left it to my team,” Khan said.

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This fight will give Pacquiao’s trainer Freddie Roach the chance to get him ready to KO his old fighter Khan. Roach trained Khan for a number of years after he was knocked out by Breidis Prescott in 2008. Roach lasted until 2012. That was when Khan was knocked out by Danny Garcia in 4 rounds. Khan then moved on after that defeat and switched Roach out for Bay Area trainer Virgil Hunter, who has been his guy ever since.

Khan hasn’t lost under Hunter’s watch, but he also hasn’t fought anyone that you can call a really good fighter. Khan’s wins since then have come against Carlos Molina, Julio Diaz, Luis Collazo, Chris Algieri and Devon Alexander. Those are or were mostly good fringe contenders.

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In facing Pacquiao, Khan is taking a considerable step up in class from the guys he’s been feasting on for the last couple of years, and I’m not sure that he’s going to be ready for that huge step up in class. You don’t go from fighting guys like Algieri, Molina and Alexander to fighting Pacquiao without going through huge shock.



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