By Dan Ambrose: Former three time world champion Erik Morales (51-7, 35 KO’s) has a number of possible opponents to fight in his next bout on July 30th, starting with a rematch against WBA interim light welterweight champion Marcos Maidana (30-2, 27 KO’s), who the 34-year-old Morales lost to on April 9th by a close 12 round majority decision.

That fight is likely going to be the one that Morales ends up taking, as Maidana wants the bout to prove that he’s the better fighter and it’s likely the best opportunity that Morales has for a good payday. The other options for Morales are as follows: Amir Khan, Marco Antonio Barrera, Matthew Hatton and Robert Guerrero. Golden Boy Promotions CEO Richard Schaefer is reportedly interested in putting Morales in with Barrera in July for a 4th fight between them.

However, it’s a fight that might not interest a lot of boxing fans in the U.S. because Barrera and Morales have been out of it for so long and are pretty much unknown fighters with the younger fans of the sport. It’s been four years since either of them did much and that’s practically a lifetime in boxing. The Maidana-Morales fight would be the smarter bout, unless Schaefer wants to take the Morales vs. Barrera 4 bout to Mexico to try and sell it there. For all practical purposes, the Morales-Barrera fight is an old timers fight because Barrera isn’t a threat to anyone at lightweight and Morales struck out against Maidana, who isn’t a champion.

A bout between Morales and Khan would be decent. However, it would make Khan look like a cherry picker because he just finished fighting an obscure Paul McCloskey, when Khan could have taken on a better known opponent like Bredis Prescott or one of the top contenders. Khan already took on old timer Barrera in a fight that ended with controversy due to a headbutt cut that Barrera suffered. The cut opened up early in the fight, yet the bout was allowed to be continued just long enough to make it count and not be ruled a no contest. It was then stopped due the nonstop bleeding from Barrera’s cut, which hadn’t gotten any worse since.

Morales vs. Matthew Hatton wouldn’t be that big of a fight unless they took it to the UK. Americans have no clue who Matthew Hatton is and likely wouldn’t in interested in seeing Morales fight him. Morales isn’t a big star in the U.S. and if you put him with an obscure fighter like Hatton, it would be like fan repellent. A Hatton-Morales fight would be a good undercard fight but not something you could sell to the public in hopes of getting good ratings or PPV money.

Morales vs. Guerrero wouldn’t be interesting either. Guerrero would beat Morales and it wouldn’t generate high ratings. I doubt that Morales wants to be beaten by a younger fighter that still has yet to build a large fan base in the U.S.