By Dan Ambrose: Unbeaten middleweight contender Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (41-0-1, 30 KO’s) has what his handlers hope will be an easy fight against junior middleweight Billy Lyell (22-8, 4 KO”s) on January 29th at the Estadio Banorte, in Culiacan, Mexico. Chavez, 24, is being matched up with a guy that’s smaller than him and who doesn’t even fight in the same division as him. Lyell is a junior middleweight and is three inches shorter than the 6 foot Chavez.

That should help Chavez pick up the win and move on to face WBC middleweight interim champion Sebastian Zbik in his next fight. Bob Arum, Chavez’s promoter, is taking things very slowly with Chavez and moving him like a chess piece to maneuver him around fighters that would likely take Chavez’s head off if they were to get the opportunity to fight him.

Lyell and Zbik aren’t much of a threat to knock Chavez out, but Zbik might have good enough technical skills to give Chavez a beating. Chavez’s trainer, Freddie Roach, is high on his potential and sees him as a future champion. Roach doesn’t say what kind of champion, though. Chavez doesn’t compare favorably with other top middleweights like David Lemieux, Gennady Golvkin, Felix Sturm, Kelly Pavlik, Dmitry Pirog and Daniel Jacobs. Perhaps Roach is just hoping that Chavez can be a paper champion and stay at the top for awhile to hold down one of the belts, picking off easy fights and paying the better fighters step aside feels until finally forced to either fight them or be stripped.

There’s talk of the WBC of making Sergio Martinez, the current WBC middleweight champion, the Super WBC champ. That in turn would open the WBC title for Chavez to move in and fight for the belt. He wouldn’t be forced to fight Martinez in the case and could basically stay away from him for the remainder of Martinez’s career without worry. It’s not exactly the most interesting option if you’re a boxing fan and were hoping to see Chavez fight Martinez some day, but that’s probably what’s going to happen.