By Dan Ambrose: It sure helps being the son of boxing great Julio Cesar Chavez. Unbeaten middleweight contender Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (41-0-1, 30 KO’s), who has faced only one fringe contender during his entire eight-year pro career, will be fighting for the WBC middleweight title this year against the new paper title holder Sebastian Zbik after the German fighter was appointed the title by the World Boxing Council.

The WBC made WBC champion Sergio Martinez the WBC champion Emeritus to clear the way for Zbik and Chavez Jr. to fight for the title in May. First, however, Chavez Jr. has to dispatch with the much smaller junior middleweight Billy Lyell (22-8, 4 KO’s), whom he faces on January 29th at the Estadio Banorte, Culiacan, Sanaloa, Mexico.

Lyell isn’t a middleweight like Chavez and isn’t ranked in the junior middleweight or middleweight divisions. But best of all, he has no power to trouble Chavez. Basically, Chavez Jr. is being handed a title shot against the paper champion Zbik without having to face a tough contender to get the shot and without having to face Martinez, who would have likely knocked Chavez out in three or four rounds.

The WBC sure helped Chavez Jr. out when they put Martinez into the Emeritus spot, because without that move, Chavez Jr. would have had to fight him and get knocked out or badly beaten up. This way his padded record won’t be hurt by having to suffer an almost certain loss in a fight against Martinez.

A fight between Chavez Jr. and Zbik is mildly interesting because both fighters haven’t faced anyone worth mentioning. Zbik has good boxing skills, but no power and a predictable style of fighting. Chavez Jr. hasn’t faced anyone other than John Duddy, and has decent power but terrible defensive skills and poor stamina.