By Sean McDaniel: Amir Khan (22-1, 16 KO’s) isn’t satisfied with just trying to get a win over Paulie Malignaggi (27-3, 5 KO’s) on Saturday night at Madison Square Garden. Khan, 23, says in an article at Sportinglife “We’ve got a game plan to take into this fight, we’ll stick to it and see how he copes with that game plan. I’ll listen to instructions from Freddie and it’s a game plan to stop him and if it’s early, it’s early but I know for a fact it won’t go the full distance. I’m definitely going to win but not only win, win in good style.” Khan seems preoccupied with looking good in his first fight in the United States.
This could lead to Khan making big mistakes and looking not as good as he hopes. The problem with Khan is that he has little experience against top level fighters and has picked up the vast majority of his wins against 2nd tier opponents. Khan beat WBA light welterweight champion Andriy Kotelnik last year to capture the title in July. A lot of people saw Kotelnik as a paper champion. Khan fans like to point out that Kotelnik has a win over WBA light welterweight interim champion Marcos Maidana.
However, the fight took place in Germany, the adopted country of Kotelnik, and many people felt that Maidana should have won the fight. The thing about Khan is that he can look good in a fight and still be in great danger of being knocked out because of his weak chin. Malignaggi may or may not have the power to test Khan’s brittle chin, but he’s going to definitely give it a good try on Saturday night. Just by staying in the fight as long as possible, Malignaggi will have a chance of putting Khan down if he can land something big.
Khan probably needs to forget about looking good in this fight and instead remember how he was knocked out in one round by Breidis Prescott and look to just win the fight by moving and jabbing. Khan has had problems getting hit with weak 2nd tier opposition in the past. That alone should make Khan wary of opening up with his offense and possibly getting taken out or dropped once or twice by Malignaggi. There are some people that think that Khan can be a great fighter in the future and there are others who see Khan as another fighter that can beat good fighters but not the cream of the crop.
Khan’s handlers are taking the go slow approach by putting him in with the weak hitting Malignaggi rather than Maidana or Timothy Bradley. The thought here is that if Khan can prove himself against Malignaggi, he’ll be ready to fight the best in the light welterweight division. That might be flawed logic. There have been plenty of excellent fighters that were good against B and C level opponents but who couldn’t handle it when they took a step up. It doesn’t matter how many B and C level fighters that were spoon fed to them, they still couldn’t handle the best.
Could this be the fate of Khan? We probably won’t know on Saturday night, but we could find out that Khan isn’t even ready for a fighter like Malignaggi, a good B level fighter. In that case, Khan will have to make some decisions about whether he’s cut out for fighting at light welterweight.
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