By Scott Gilfoid: Whether Ricky Hatton (45-1, 32 KOs) ends up fighting both Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr. in 2009, I think Hatton’s career will be forever tainted unless he steps it up and gives both Junior Witter (37-2-2, 22 KOs) and Timothy Bradley (23-0, 11 KOs) at some point in time. Hatton, for obvious reasons, would be better off fighting them sooner rather than later, because he’s now 30 and his many ring wars are starting to show their effects on him.
Who knows how much time he has left before he ends up hanging up his gloves once and for all and retires from boxing. I don’t even care if Hatton loses to both Pacquiao and Mayweather, which will probably happen regardless, but what’s important is that Hatton Man’s up and fights them both.
Witter, 34, perhaps the best light welterweight in the World for the best four years until recently being dethroned by Bradley in a 12-round split decision loss in May, has been calling out Hatton for years unsuccessfully.
I had no idea why or how Hatton could have chosen to ignore Witter for all these years, because it was clear that Witter had the goods and wasn’t just a pretender like some of the loud-mouth fighters from England. But instead of facing him, Hatton chose to ignore Witter, saying that he didn’t like Witter slagging him off in the media.
It sure worked for Haye, didn’t it? Vitali Klitschko wasn’t afraid to stand up firmly, and look Haye in the eyes and accept his challenge. For whatever reason, Hatton doesn’t want it. The same holds for Bradley, who is very interested in a fight with Hatton, but like Witter, Bradley is getting no nibbles from Hatton.
With speed and extraordinary power, Bradley is possibly the best light welterweight to emerge in the division in more than a decade and few boxing fans and writers would argue with this. It’s frankly troubling to see Hatton taking fights with Mayweather and Pacquiao, yet ignoring two well-deserving fighters like Bradley and Witter.
For me, Hatton should ignore those two fights, which I feel he doesn’t deserve yet, and fight both Bradley and Witter. If he can beat those two guys, then, yes, by all means, go ahead and fight Pacquiao and Mayweather. The tragedy is that both Witter and Bradley could probably beat Hatton, and move onto bigger fights themselves like Pacquiao and Mayweather.
If we’re looking for truly the best fighters taking on the best fighters, then Hatton needs to take on Witter and Bradley before moving onto bigger game. Let’s not kid ourselves here, Hatton is probably going to get beaten to the curb by both Pacquiao and Mayweather, and probably look like crap in losing to them.
Not to put too fine of a point, these fighters are probably going to be slaughters of the first order, with Hatton getting blasted around the ring like a rag muffin, eating punches and unable to get off his short body punches.
Maybe then he’ll finally choose to fight Witter and Bradley, but unfortunately by then it may not count for much, because neither of them will get much credit for beating Hatton if he’s already been beaten by Pacquiao and Mayweather prior to that.
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