By Jim Dower: Former lightweight champion Nate Campbell (33-5-1, 25 KO’s) looks to be fighting lightweight contender Victor Ortiz (25-2-1, 20 KO’s) on May 15th on the undercard of the Amir Khan vs. Juan Manuel Marquez fight, according to Dan Rafael. On paper, this doesn’t look like a good fight at all for the 37-year-old Campbell, who didn’t look good in the three rounds of action in his previous fight at light welterweight against Timothy Bradley in August 2009.

Although the fight ended after Campbell received a nasty cut from a head butt in the 3rd, Campbell looked too slow and not exactly powerful for the weight. Ortiz, 23, didn’t look himself last year in getting stopped in the 6th round by Marcos Maidana in June. However, Ortiz is a natural light welterweight and is very strong and quick for the weight, unlike Campbell.

This looks like a fight that Ortiz should win because of his bigger size, better quickness and power. Campbell is two inches shorter than the 5’9” Ortiz, but not nearly as powerful or as quick as him. Campbell would be better off taking on an easier option than Ortiz. He doesn’t have the power to do what Maidana did to Ortiz and I can see this fight ending badly for Campbell, especially if he tries to slug it out with Victor.

Campbell won on top of the world in 2008 after defeating then unbeaten Juan Diaz to snatch the WBA and WBC lightweight titles. However, missed out on a good payday against Joan Guzman after the fighter couldn’t make weight for their This left Campbell without a fight for a long time until almost a year later when he took on the lanky Ali Funeka, beat him by a 12 round majority decision in February 2009.

Campbell was unable to make weight for that fight and ended up losing his titles. Rather than stay at lightweight, Campbell opted to move up in weight because he could no longer make the lightweight limit without great struggle.