By Eric Thomas: WBA light welterweight champion Amir Khan (24-1, 17 KO’s) dodged a bullet on Saturday night when he was able to survive being badly hurt by the hard punching Marcos Maidana (29-2, 27 KO’s) in the 10th round and make it through the remainder of the fight by holding Maidana and running. The movement from Khan was fine and perfectly reasonable, but Khan’s constant holding of Maidana by hooking one arm at a time wasn’t okay. However, what made it even worse was that with Maidana still with one arm free while being held and tagging Khan over and over again, referee Joe Cortez stepped in repeatedly to separate Khan and Maidana during these occasions.

The way it worked out was that it saved Khan from taking massive punishment and perhaps even knocked out by Maidana in the final three rounds. It’s starting that a referee with as much experience as Cortez would elect to separate Khan and Maidana when Marcos had one hand free and was literally clubbing Khan with big shots one after another.

By stepping in each time to separate Khan and Maidana, it saved Khan from getting hit and it also gave him separation to run around more and jab when he was badly hurt. I think this really benefited Khan greatly and I think he would have been knocked out had a different referee had worked the fight.

In hindsight, it was wise of Khan’s management team to select Cortez as the referee to work the fight because he a referee that is well known for having worked the Ricky Hatton vs. Floyd Mayweather Jr. bout in 2007. In that fight, Cortez often separated Hatton from Mayweather when Ricky was trying to work on the inside. It was hoped that Cortez wouldn’t do the same thing in the Khan-Maidana fight, but it looks as if he did to some extent during the crucial moments of the fight.

I counted seven separate times in the last three rounds in which Cortez stepped in the pull the two fighters apart while Maidana had one hand free while the other was clearly being held by Khan. Each time that Cortez pulled the two fighters apart, Maidana was tagging Khan with his free hand, which is what you’re supposed to do. The referee isn’t supposed to separate the two fighters when one righter has one hand free and is still punching. In this case, it may have saved Khan from being further hurt or even knocked out.

Seeing how well Khan did with Cortez as the referee you have to wonder Cortez will continue to work future fights involving Khan against fighters that have good inside games. If I was Khan, I think I would, because Cortez seems to jump in way too quickly to break up action when fighters are tying to work on the inside. Since Khan has no real inside game, he’s likely to continue to benefit if Cortez works his fights.

After the fight, Maidana complained about Cortez, feeling like he had to fight two people in the ring last Saturday night – Khan and Cortez. However, Maidana and his team should have said something ahead of time when they found out Cortez was going to be the referee. It’s too late now, but they should have spoke up before the fight if they wanted to avoid any problems.

I think it was pure genius by Khan’s team to select Cortez to work the fight because he was perfect for this bout as he may have got in the way just enough during the crucial rounds for Khan to stay upright and not get knocked out. It obviously wasn’t something that Cortez purposely did, but rather he tends to break action a little too quickly when fighters are working on the inside. I think his breaks in the action really hurt Maidana last Saturday night.