By Chris Williams: After 21 pro fights it’s surprising how little quality competition that lightweight Amir Khan (20-1, 15 KOs) has faced up to this point in his career. Of all the opponents that have been fed to him, I only rate Breidis Prescott as being the one true threat and he ended up knocking Khan out in the 1st round last year in September.
On June 27th, Khan will be jumping up a division to take on World Boxing Association light welterweight champion Andriy Kotelnik, perhaps the weakest of the light welterweight champions in the division.
Khan was wise to choose Kotelnik, because if he had chosen the other champions in the light welterweight division Timothy Bradley, Juan Urango and Kendall Holt then Khan would have been in trouble trying to win a title against the likes of them.
I can’t see Khan beating any of them even on his best day. The timing of Khan’s departure from the lightweight division seems rather odd to me. Had Khan stuck around for a little while longer he would have been faced with having to look at the prospects of taking on tough fighters like Paulus Moses, Ali Funeka, Anthony Peterson, Joan Guzman and Urbano Antillon at some point.
Those kinds of fighters are many times better than the fodder that was fed to Khan during his career. Khan would have been severely tested by any of them and if Khan’s chin was as bad as I think it is, he would likely lose to all of them.
This is why it seems to be good timing on Khan’s part that he disappeared suddenly from the lightweight division just when he was finally going to be forced to fight some quality fighters for once in his career. If Khan can win the WBA light welterweight title over the light hitting Kotelnik, it buys Khan a little time.
Khan could then fight a non-mandatory challenger in his first defense and I suspect that Amir would take from the bottom of the head, choosing the number #15 contender Norio Kimura rather than a more highly ranked fighter like Nate Campbell that boxing fans would like to see.
Kimura would an easy fight for Khan because he has no power to trouble Amir. Then Khan could take on either Dimitri Salita, the current number #1 ranked challenger for the WBA belt, or Marcus Maidana, a knockout puncher with big power. Let me guess which one Khan will try to fight.
At some point if Khan is able to get by Salita and Kimura, he will be finally be looking fighting opponents like Victor Ortiz, Campbell and Lamont Peterson. My guess is that Khan will then vacate the title and move back down rather than take those fights and rick getting knocked out once again.
I can’t see Khan beating any of them or Maidana. Forced with losing his title by a likely knockout, Khan will probably move down in weight and start picking and choosing opponents in the lightweight division, trying to get in position where he can get a title shot without having to face dangerous threats like Funeka, Guzman or Michael Katsidis.
Comments are closed.