By Sean McDaniel: Brendon Smith, the trainer/manager for lightweight contender Michael Katsidis (27-3, 22 KO’s), says that WBA/WBO lightweight champion Juan Manuel Marquez really didn’t beat his fighter in their fight in November. Katsidis lost that fight by a 9th round TKO in pretty much a one-sided fight aside from the 3rd round when Katsidis dropped Marquez with a left hand. Smith doesn’t see the fight as having hurt Katsidis’ standing with the boxing public and now wants Katsidis, who stands only 5’7″, to fight WBA light welterweight champion Amir Khan next.
In an article at the AAP, Smith said “He [Katsidis] had a little bit of bruising around the eyes and a small cut, but he wasn’t hurt badly in the fight. He was just spent emotionally. He did a wonderful job under the circumstances. However, I don’t feel Juan beat us. We all know what we had to deal with leading up to the fight. Micheal’s stocks are going up. He’s won a lot of hearts around the world and he deserves it.”
I saw the Katsidis-Marquez fight and it looked pretty one-sided to me. It was as if Marquez couldn’t miss with his shots and was tagging Katsidis at will. I give Katsidis credit for taking the huge punishment and continuing to come forward to land shots of his own in the 6th, 7th and 8th rounds when Marquez looked a little less energetic, but Katsidis was still taking enormous punishment. And the fight exposed Katsidis’ lack of right hand power in a big way. He’s a good – not great – puncher with his left hand when he’s throwing his hooks, but his right hand is incredibly weak. He doesn’t have the kind of power in that hand that he needs to in order to beat the better fighters in the lightweight and/or light welterweight divisions.
Smith continues “I believe that [Katsidis-Khan] is a fight that would absolutely fill anywhere in England, and that’s a fight that would be watched all over the world and it makes a great fight.”
Smith is right about the fight drawing a lot of fans in the UK and getting attention around the world. In terms of getting fans interest, a fight between Khan and Katsidis is a much better fight than Khan facing some relatively obscure fighter like Lamont Peterson. The casual British boxing fan will likely not have heard of Peterson and will be much less interested in seeing Khan fight him. But with Katsidis, they know who he is because he’s come to England on a number of occasions and wiped out fighters like Graham Earl and Kevin Mitchell.
However, it wouldn’t be a very good fight because Katsidis is short, wide open on defense and doesn’t have the power to hurt Khan unless he can somehow find a way to land his left hook against Khan. You can expect that Khan would be moving constantly, jabbing and keeping the fight at long rang. By the time that Khan finally tires out late in the fight, Katsidis will likely be a bloody mess and unable to do anything. It’s a mismatch and a fight that wouldn’t really prepare Khan to face the Devon Alexander vs. Timothy Bradley winner.
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