By Dave Lahr: What’s the middleweight division coming to when the best fighter in the division, WBC middleweight champion Sergio Martinez (46-2-2, 25 KO’s), has to settle for #15 ranked World Boxing Council middleweight contender Andy Lee (24-1, 18 KO’s) for his next fight in March instead of a more interesting opponent like Gennady Golovkin, Hassan N’Dam N’Jikam, Felix Sturm, Darren Barker or David Lemieux.

A fight against the skinny 6’2” southpaw Lee is going to be a huge mismatch of epic proportions. Lee hasn’t done much since he was taken out in the 7th round two years ago by Bryan Vera in March 2008. Although Lee has won nine consecutive fights since then, the opposition has been all 2nd tier opponents without any quality guys since then.

If Martinez selects Lee, it’s going to look like he’s scraping the bottom of the barrel. I’d much rather see Martinez fight another rematch with Paul Williams rather than see him crush Lee. Martinez took Williams out with a 2nd round knockout in their rematch in November.

Martinez surprised Williams when he tagged him with a straight left hand in the 2nd that knocked Williams cold and left him on the canvas with both eyes wide open. Williams wasn’t expecting Martinez to come out throwing bombs, because in the first fight Martinez used a hit and run style.

Lee doesn’t have the huge punching power that Martinez possesses and hence won’t be able to trade with him without risking getting his head taken off. Martinez is a lot sturdier than the slender Lee, and I can see this fight as being a really bad mismatch. It’s too bad that Martinez can’t get a fight with Manny Pacquiao because that would be fun to see Martinez swat Pacquiao around the ring for six or seven rounds before taking him out.