By Scott Gilfoid: WBA light welterweight champion Amir Khan (23-1, 17 KO’s) defeated former International Boxing Federation light welterweight champion Paulie Malignaggi (27-4, 5 KO’s) last Saturday night at Madison Square Garden. Khan, 23, basically wore the 29-year-old Malignaggi down with jabs and right hands until the fight was ultimately stopped by referee Steve Smoger in the 11th at 1:25 of the round. Ideally, the fight should have been stopped in the 8th round, as Malignaggi was no longer competitive by this stage of the fight.

After the fight, Khan, with pushing from HBO analyst Max Kellerman, said that he’d like to fight WBA light welterweight interim champion Marcos Maidana (28-1, 27 KO’s) next. Khan said “He’s [Maidana] a good fighter. We know how to beat Maidana. I know I can beat Maidana. If he wants to fight me, tell him to get in the line. I’d love to fight him if he wants to fight me. Let’s have it next. A lot of people have put a lot of pressure on me why I don’t fight Maidana. I’ll fight Maidana next. Let Timothy Bradley [the WBO light welterweight champion] fight [Devon] Alexander. The winner of that will face in the finals. It’s like having a semi finals – me and Maidana and Alexander and Timothy Bradley. Let’s do it. I’m not going to leave it [the light welterweight division] until I unify the titles and I’m number #1.”

What Khan isn’t saying is that Maidana does want to fight him and has wanted to fight him. Khan and his promoters Golden Boy Promotions didn’t want to fight Maidana, making the excuse that he wasn’t well known enough for Khan to fight him yet, even though the average boxing fan in the United States didn’t have clue one who Khan was. At best, it was a poor excuse to night fight Maidana and it was painfully obvious why the feather-fisted Malignaggi was selected as Khan’s opponent for last Saturday rather than Maidana.

Had this been Maidana that Khan was fighting, he would have been in real trouble. Khan wouldn’t have been able to jab his way to a victory. He’d have had to literally fight for his life in there. Based on what I saw of Khan in his fight against Malignaggi, I think he’d last around six rounds against Maidana before getting knocked cold and that’s if Khan runs for his life. Maidana is just too powerful and is an excellent fighter. Khan can’t fight to save his life on the inside and is almost helpless.

The only thing that Khan does on the inside is either grab his opponent in a head lock, grab the neck and push down on the head of his opponents, clinch or throw rabbit punches. I thought that Khan should have been penalized for the constant headlocks. He did that way too much when in close and a more alert referee would have given him warnings about that and taken off points. Obviously, the headlocks are a tactic that Khan is using to disguise his inability to fight on the inside.

Against Maidana, Khan will be getting clocked in close and will be on the move the entire time. He won’t be able to just stand in front of Maidana and stock him all night long like he did against the hand-picked Malignaggi. I got to really hand it to his trainer Freddie Roach and his promoters; they really picked the perfect easy mark for Khan to beat and look good against. It’s no surprise that Malignaggi was picked because he had no power to speak of and was basically helpless against Khan.

Do I think Khan will fight Maidana next? Are you kidding? Heck no! Khan won’t get anywhere near Maidana. I see Khan’s management continuing to match him soft and will likely put him in with someone ranked lower down in the WBA light welterweight stack. I can even see them selecting WBO lightweight interim champion Michael Katsidis to fight in a move where they would be basically cutting the grass of Juan Manuel Marquez. I think it would be a mistake, because I think Katsidis would know Khan out to. But that’s who they’ll probably put Khan in with next. If not him, then someone ranked lower in the WBA top 15.

I would be frankly shocked if they match Khan with Maidana. That would break the entire pattern of how Khan has been handled since he turned pro. Future events cast their shadows before. I see Khan being put in with more beatable, soft touches like he’s been matched against until he eventually gets the mega fight he wants against Floyd Mayweather Jr. or Manny Pacquiao.