By Jason Kim: The Ring magazine will be picking the winner of the August 14th clash between WBC light heavyweight champion Jean Pascal and Chad Dawson as their champion of the light heavyweight division. It’s hard to understand why Dawson, 27, hasn’t already been picked by The Ring as the champion years ago, because he’s clearly been the best fighter in the light heavyweight division for at least two, if not three years. While some would say that Bernard Hopkins deserved that title, I don’t agree with that.

Hopkins hasn’t been fighting light heavyweights in the past three years, so I can’t see him as deserving the title. Since 2007, Hopkins has fought Winky Wright, Joe Calzaghe, Kelly Pavlik, Enrique Ornelas and Roy Jones Jr. of the that bunch, only Jones is a light heavyweight, and he’s clearly not the same fighter he once was. Dawson, though, has beaten light heavyweights Glen Johnson twice and Antonio Tarver twice.

Those wins have proven far and away that Dawson deserves to be the Ring champion. The only fighters that Dawson hasn’t fought during these years is Hopkins, who hasn’t shown any interest in fighting Dawson despite the fact that he’s been calling Hopkins out constantly, and Tavoris Cloud, a new comer. Dawson and Cloud will almost surely be fighting Cloud in the next year or so.

Pascal only moved to the light heavyweight division last year and has twice beaten Adrian Diaconu. Those were good wins, but I’m not sure why he’s being considered for the Ring 175 pound champion when Pascal hasn’t fought more than two fighters at light heavyweight. I would much prefer the title of champion to go in a fight between Cloud and Pascal, because Cloud is still unbeaten, whereas Pascal was soundly defeated in December 2008 by Carl Froch.

I find it hard to understand how Pascal could be seen as potential Ring Champion at this early stage and with his recent loss. He didn’t look great in his last fight against Diaconu, and I barely had Pascal winning that fight. It doesn’t matter that his shoulder was dislocated. He still didn’t look very impressive. And I expect Pascal to get totally blown out by Dawson. And I do think Dawson is the one that should get the title, but I think it’s not the right fight to determine who the Ring Champions should be. For me, it should be Dawson-Cloud, because I see Cloud as the 2nd best fighter in the division behind Dawson. I think Pascal is a good fighter, but I see him as a number #4 fighter behind Dawson, Cloud, and Johnson.