By Jeff Aranow: Undefeated WBC Silver light welterweight champion Josh Taylor (10-0, 9 KOs) will be back inside the ring defending his 140 pound title against former IBF lightweight champion Miguel Vazquez (39-5, 15 KOs) in a 12 round scheduled bout on November 11 at the Royal Highland Centre in Edinburgh, Scotland.
The 2012 Olympian Taylor, 26, looked great in his last fight in defeating the previously unbeaten Ohara Davies by a 7th round knockout win on July 8 at the Braehead Arena in Glasgow, Scotland. Taylor fought well in dropping Davies twice in the contest in knocking him down in the 3rd and 7th rounds. Taylor was talking to Davies as he flattened him with a right hand in the 7th. The contest was then stopped by referee Howard John Foster.
Taylor is ranked #7 WBC, #11 IBF at 140. With Crawford still holding down the WBA, WBC and WBO light welterweight titles, Taylor would be better off waiting for him to vacate his belts and move up to the 147 lb. division before going after those titles.
Vazquez, 30, has seen his career go downhill in the last 3 years with defeats against Mickey Bey and Argenis Mendez. Vazquez lost his IBF 135 lb. title to Mickey Bey in losing a close 12 round split decision on September 13, 2014. Vazquez had held the IBF lightweight title for four years from 2010 to 2014. Those defeats were arguably not fair decisions.
Vazquez was practically unbeatable during that time from. Since losing to Mendez by a 10 round unanimous decision on October 5, 2015, Vazquez has won his last 4 fights in beating Erick Bone, Armando Paine, Javier Mercado and Jose Daniel Ruiz. Those are not great fighters. However, Bone is a pretty solid guy. It shows a lot that Vazquez was able to beat him easily by a 10 round unanimous decision last year on May 28.
Taylor will need to be patient against Vazquez, who is hard to hit because of his highly skilled defensive ability. Vazquez, 5’10”, has long arms and he uses his reach to out-box his opponents. Vazquez will have a three inch reach advantage over Taylor in this fight. You can expect Vazquez to try and use his reach to slap Taylor around if he can.
It’ll be up to Taylor to stay patient and not start swinging wildly for the fences. It’s good that Taylor will be fighting at home in front of his own boxing fans at Scotland. If the fight were to take place in the U.S or Mexico, it might be a tougher task for Taylor to deal with Vazquez if he’s fighting in front of a friendly crowd cheering him.