Lucas Matthysse likely for Canelo-Khan undercard on 5/7

By Boxing News - 02/12/2016 - Comments

matthysse456By Dan Ambrose: Former world title challenger Lucas Matthysse (37-4, 34 Kos) will be moving up to the welterweight division for his next fight, and he’s being talked about fighting in the co-feature bout on the Saul “Canelo” Alvarez v. Amir Khan fight card on May 7 at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.

With Matthysse being targeted for the co-feature bout, it’s going to mean that he’ll very likely be matched against a fairly tough opponent. Hopefully, Matthysse is up to the task because this would be his first fight in the 147lb division at the full weight.

Matthysse, 33, lost his last fight to Viktor Postol by a 10th round knockout last October. Matthysse quit in the 10th round after suffering an eye injury. However, before he quit, Matthysse was being dominated by Postol and going very little.

It’s unlikely that Matthysse will do any better at 147 than he did at 140. He’ll be facing bigger guys that have better power, size and hand speed. You can understand why Matthysse would want to move up in weight because the potential for bigger money fights would be there for him if he can pick up enough wins to get a high ranking. Mattysse might even get a world title fight in the near future if he can fight frequently enough to get ranked.

Matthysse might want to go after the winner of the Jessie Vargas vs. Sadam Ali fight, because the winner of that fight will be picking up the vacant WBO 147lb title. Vargas and Ali are flawed fighters and Matthysse might do well against them.

Matthysse looked bad in losing to Danny Garcia in 2013. Matthysse rebounded from those defeats to beat John Molina Jr., Roberto Ortiz and Ruslan Provodnikov. However, the Molina and Provodnikov fights proved to be very difficult for Matthysse in which he took a great deal of punishment.

“He has been at 140 for his entire career and even fought at that weight as an amateur,” said Golden Boy Promotions vice president Eric Gomez to ESPN.com. “I think for him to go to 147 will make him better. He won’t have to struggle to come down in weight. Matthysse has always been a guy who would fight anybody,” Gomez said. “He could fight Sadam Ali if he beats Vargas, any of the top guys. Maybe Tim Bradley, maybe a rematch with Provodnikov. Maybe Manny Pacquiao would be interested in fighting him. That would be a great fight.”

Provodnikov shook Matthysse up on several occasions in the later rounds of their fight in April 2015. It’s perhaps for this reason that it wasn’t a good idea to put Matthysse in with Viktor Postol just six months later in October 2015. Matthysse would have been better off taking an easier fight that wouldn’t give him the kind of punishment that he absorbed against Postol.

“Lucas Matthysse is moving up to 147 and likely going to fight in the #CaneloKhan co-feature. Opponent TBA. #boxing,” Dan Rafael said on his Twitter.

If Matthysse wants a world title fight, he needs to go after the more beatable guys like Danny Garcia and the winner of the Jessie Vasquez vs. Sadam Ali fight. Fighting IBF champion Kell Brook or WBA champion Keith Thurman might not be a good idea for Matthysse because those guys are bigger welterweights with a lot of punching power.

Matthysse should start slow and work his way up before attempting to fight the bigger guys like Thurman and Brook. The one negative that is working against Matthysse in taking the slow approach is his advanced age. Matthysse is 33 now, and he cannot afford to take his time because he’ll age out if he takes the slow approach.



Comments are closed.