By Dan Ambrose: Former WBC middleweight champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (49-2-1, 32 KOs) believes he’s embarrassing the 160lb division by facing welterweight [147] Amir Khan (31-3, 19 KOs) in a catch-weight fight at 155lbs in their fight at May 7. Chavez Jr. thinks the 155lb. catch-weight between Khan and Canelo shouldn’t be allowed.
It’s unclear why Chavez Jr. would take issue with Canelo fighting Khan because since Chavez Jr. moved up in weight from middleweight to the super middleweight division in 2013, three out of his four fights have been against 160lb fighters pulled up from the middleweight division to fight him at light heavyweight.
Chavez Jr. has twice fought middleweight Brian Vera and the Marco Reyes. Chavez Jr. did fight light heavyweight Andrzej Fonfara last April with disastrous consequences with Chavez Jr. getting stopped in the 10th round by a guy the same size as him. Chavez Jr. complained later that Fonfara was bigger than him, but that wasn’t so. Fonfara was taller than Chavez Jr., yes, but not heavier than him. It was just a rare occasion where Chavez Jr. had fought someone his own size and he did not do well.
“Canelo fight with all due respect is an embarrassment to the middleweight,” Chavez Jr. said on his Twitter. “A 140 (pounds) fighting at that weight (155 lbs) dishonors box (sic). We all know who wins.”
It shouldn't be permitted. Next Chavez jr fight is against Chris Algeria 🙈
— Julio Cesar Chavez (@jcchavezjr1) February 3, 2016
There’s a lot of money to be made for Canelo fighting welterweights like Khan. It’s not as if Canelo hasn’t dipped into the lower weight classes to fight opponents in the past. Canelo fought light welterweight Josesito Lopez in 2012. Canelo fought welterweights Kermit Cintron, Alfonso Gomez, Matthew Hatton and Carlos Baldomir at junior middleweight. Canelo fighting Khan is more or less business as usual.
This whole catch-weight thing has been going on for a while now with both Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao using them. Miguel Cotto and Canelo have both followed Mayweather and Pacquiao in carrying on the catch-weight tradition. It’s a negative thing in a sense, but what can you?
There isn’t a boxing commission that will put a stop to the catch-weights, and even if there was a commission to stop it, I don’t think they would. There’s big money in catch-weight fights because it enables fighters from division weight classes to fight each other. Where it becomes a problem is when a fighter games the system in order to gain an advantage over his opponents.
You can make an argument that Canelo is gaining advantage over his opponents by using the 155lb catch-weight for his fights, because he doesn’t need it because he’s clearly a full middleweight in size. We see that with Canelo rehydrating over 170lbs. But it can potentially weaken Canelo’s middleweight opponents if they have to move down five pounds from 160 to fight him at 155. Canelo hasn’t used the catch-weight handicap against a normal sized middleweight yet like Gennady Golovkin, but we could see that employed in if the two of them face each other in 2016.
“Canelo vs Amir Khan will be a battle. 2016 will be a great year for boxing,” Golovkin said on his Twitter.
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