By William Mackay: 34-year-old Zab Judah (42-7, 29 KO’s) may have turned his career around temporarily with a 9th round stoppage victory over #4 IBF 140 pound contender Vernon Paris last Saturday night in their IBF light welterweight eliminator bout at the Aviator Sports Complex in Brooklyn, New York.

Judah will now be next in line to fight the May 19th winner of Amir Khan vs. Lamont Peterson II, although Judah’s chances of a rematch with Khan are about slim and none. Khan has already said he won’t be sticking around if he gets a win over Peterson in the rematch and will move up in weight to 147. As such, Judah won’t get a chance to avenge his 5th round TKO loss to Khan from last July.

Judah said this as quoted by thesun.co.uk “The real Judah will show up” [to face Khan vs. Peterson winner].

Judah was completely dominated by Khan, and while the stoppage was a very questionable one due to Khan holding Judah down with his left hand and hitting him with his right, it’s pretty clear that Judah was going to lose that fight anyway. There is a chance that Khan could hold onto the IBF title and face Judah if Khan has butterflies about moving up in weight to the welterweight division where there are bigger punchers, but it’s not likely. Khan wants a fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. and he seems to think that by moving up in weight it will increase his chances of getting that shot.

Judah will likely end up facing Peterson for Khan’s vacant belt if Khan is able to defeat Peterson in their rematch. That’s a big IF because Peterson really had Khan’s number in their December fight, and if Khan is serious about not shoving Peterson like he did quite frequently the last time they fought, then Khan will be forced to run and hold the entire fight because he won’t have the shoving to fall back on to keep Peterson off of him.