By William Mackay: Former World Boxing Council light welterweight champion Junior Witter (37-3-2, 22 KO’s) plans on continuing his floundering career by moving up to the welterweight division in hopes that he can find easier pickings at the higher weight class. The move reeks of desperation on Witter’s part, because even as a light welterweight, Witter wasn’t considered to be very big. At 5’7” with a slender frame, it’s hard to imagine what Witter can be thinking by moving up in weight.
After seeing how the equally small Devon Alexander was able to manhandle Witter in an 8th round stoppage victory on August 1st, it seems like a crazy idea for Witter to be moving up to fight the likes of Miguel Cotto, Andre Berto, Antonio Margarito, Joshua Clottey, Isaac Hlatschwayo and Shane Mosley. And those are just some of the top names that I can see beating the 35-year-old Witter to a pulp.
Besides them, there’s the young contenders Jesus Soto Karass, Saul Alvarez, Luis Carlos Abregu, Kell Brook and Selcuk Aydin who would be big problems for Witter. There’s also Zab Judah, who soundly defeated Witter nine years ago, beating him by a one-sided 12-round unanimous decision in 2000.
You would think that Witter might be better served if he would retire from boxing judiging by his quit job against Devon Alexander last month. Witter fought reasonably well in parts of the fight against Alexander. However, as the rounds progressed, Witter was staggered a couple of times by big shots from Alexander, a fighter who is only a marginal puncher at best.
The fight was still competitive at the end of the 8th round. However, for some bizarre reason, Witter decided to quit right then and there, pointing out that he had injured his left elbow and saying “it just wasn’t my night.” For Witter to quit in a fight that he was still doing well in seems hard for many boxing fans to understand, because they had expected that Witter would fight until the final ounce of energy was left in his body and not end of quitting like that.
Witter didn’t win any fans with this move. Witter said that he was fighting with only one arm, but he was doing a good job of it. This was a top fighter Witter was in against, which makes not only the quit job seem strange but also Witter’s new announcement that he plans on moving up to the welterweight division.
I’m now wondering whether Alexander not only injured Witter’s elbow in their fight but also knocked something loose upstairs in Witter’s brain housing, because why would Witter want to move up in weight when he’s one of the top fighters in the world at light welterweight?
That just doesn’t make any sense at all and looks like a move doomed for failure in the end. It’s too bad that Witter was never able to lure big named fighters like Ricky Hatton and Amir Khan into fighting him. With Witter moving up in weight, the chances of a fight against Hatton or Khan pretty much disappear forever.
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