By Dan Ambrose: Oscar De La Hoya, the promoter for WBA light welterweight champion Amir Khan (24-1, 17 KO’s), sees the British fighter not only winning tonight against Paul McCloskey (22-0, 12 KO’s) at the M.E.N. Arena in Manchester, England, but then moving up in weight and winning titles in five weight classes. De La Hoya sees the 24-year-old Khan achieving super stardom.
De La Hoya said this to Sky Sports: “He’s [Khan] on the right track to becoming one of those fighters who people will talk about for years to come. He has the talent, the drive and motivation to become great…There is no doubt in my mind he can be a five weight division champion. I think he’s going to become one of the greats.”
For Khan to become a five weight champion, he will have to win titles in the welterweight, junior middleweight, middleweight and super middleweight divisions. That’s a big ask for a fighter that doesn’t have a great chin and who recently went life and death with Marcos Maidana. With all the titles there are in boxing, it’s possible for De La Hoya to skillfully maneuver Khan by cherry-picking the weakest of champions in each division and then having them agree to a weight handicap catchweight. Those catchweight handicaps really help the fighter moving up in weight because it forces the bigger fighter to take off more weight, leaving them weaker for having done it. But if De La Hoya were to match Khan against the best champions or even the second best champions, I can’t see Khan making it through the welterweight division without getting beaten a couple of times.
Khan is capable of beating the two weakest of the welterweight champions Vyacheslav Senchenko and Jan Zaveck, but that’s probably about it. Andre Berto would be dangerous for Khan, and Manny Pacquiao would probably easily knock Khan out. As far as Khan moving up to junior middleweight, he would have to be matched against someone like IBF champion Cornelius Bundradge. He’s beatable. But WBO champion Sergiy Dzinziruk, WBA champion Miguel Cotto and WBC champion Saul Alvarez would all likely beat Khan and knock him out. At middleweight, Khan would have to be steered in the direction of Sebastian Sylvester, the IBF champion and WBC champ Sebastian Zbik.
Those guys are beatable. However, by the time Khan gets to that level, those guys will likely have been beaten and replaced with better fighters. At super middleweight, Khan would have to be put in with Robert Stieglitz, the WBO super middleweight champion. He’s perceived to be the weakest of the four champions. If you put Khan in with Andre Ward, Lucian Bute or Carl Froch, then you’re asking to see Khan to get knocked out.
As such, it is possible for Khan to cherry pick his way to five titles but how much credit will he truly get if he’s facing the weaker, much less popular champions that boxing fans don’t really follow that closely or care much about. You don’t really get a lot of credit if you just win titles to add to your collection without facing the biggest names.
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