Khan says it’s almost a done deal that he’ll be fighting the Marquez-Diaz winner – News

By Boxing News - 07/21/2010 - Comments

By William Mackay: Amir Khan (23-1, 17 KO’s) plans on traveling to Las Vegas next week to watch the lightweight clash between WBA/WBO champion Juan Manuel Marquez vs. Juan Diaz at the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino to get a close look at who the 23-year-old Khan will likely fight next in December.

Khan is hoping it will be the 36-year-old Marquez, who is promoted by the same promotional company as Khan, Golden Boy Promotions. In an article at Theboltonnews.co.uk, Khan says “It is nearly agreed that I will fight the winner and I would like it to be over here next time, but it depends on the opponent and the broadcasters.”

Its unclear what Khan meant by the broadcasters. That should have nothing to do with anything. However, it’s going to be tough to get the much more experienced and accomplished Marquez to travel all the way to England to fight someone like Khan, who has won only one title in short career, the WBA strap, and that came against what many boxing fans felt was a paper champion. Khan didn’t beat someone Timothy Bradley or Devon Alexander to get his WBA belt. He got it against Andriy Kotelnik, who isn’t a big puncher.

There’s a question of whether Marquez will even take the Khan fight if he comes out the winner. Khan may know something that we don’t know, of course, but Marquez already said no to Khan before. Unless Golden Boy Promotions has enticed Marquez with a big offer, he may just turn around and say no again and instead continue to defend his WBA/WBO lightweight titles. If Marquez defeats Diaz, which is very likely, he can take on the WBO lightweight interim champion Michael Katsidis next in a bout that HBO will probably be all over.

Khan says that Katsidis and John Murray, two lightweights that Khan wanted to fight, priced themselves out of a fight with Khan by asking for too much money. Khan says “If they want to fight me they will take the fight.”

In other words, if they want to fight Khan, they need to take the small money.

I hope Khan isn’t going to be that way for his entire career because he may find it tough to get good opponents to build his name up. I mean there are only so many Paulie Malignaggi and Marco Antonio Barreras for Khan to fight before he’s going to be forced to fight someone good and pay them if he wants to continue to make a name for himself. The top light welterweights want to fight Khan, but it looks as if he’s got his eye on some smaller lightweights.



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