By Chris Williams: Nonito Donaire (28-1, 18 KO’s), a three division world champion, has been pegged by some boxing fans as the next Manny Pacquiao. At least he was considered on his way to that point until he started getting matched up against smaller guys over and over again, and fighters that aren’t much of a threat to beating him.

His promoter Bob Arum moved Doniare up to super bantamweight recently, and instead of matching him against the division’s best fighter in WBA World super bantamweight champion Guillermo Rigondeaux, Donaire was put in with Wilfredo Vazquez Jr., who had recently been stopped by Jorge Arce. There’s no question that the guy that Donaire needs to fight is Rigondeaux. But instead of facing him, Donaire will be fighting a guy from a division below in the light hitting Cristian Mijares on July 14th in another safe fight for Donaire. Even after Donaire beats Mijares, he’s still not going to be matched against Rigondeaux. Instead it will be either Arce or Toshiaki Nishioka, a 36-year-old WBC Emeritus champion. He’s a decent fighter but I consider him well below Rigondeaux.

My point here is Donaire isn’t facing the guys he needs to be facing to become a huge star like Pacquiao, although I personally don’t consider Pacquiao to be a great fighter. Instead Donaire seems to be getting matched up against guys that Arum feels he can succeed against. It all seems like pure business rather than trying to match him against the best. I see Donaire being matched up against guys that are for the most part smaller OR weaker than him. I don’t think we’ll ever see Donaire being put in with wrecking machine featherweights or super featherweights if Arum ever does move him up in weight again. Can you imagine what a slugger like Orlando Salido would do to Donaire? It would be brutal. The same goes for Juanma or Adrien Broner.

Here are the guys that Donaire needs to fight for him to get to the Pacquiao level:

* Guillermo Rigondeaux

* Orlando Salido

* Juan Manuel Lopez

* Yuriorkis Gamboa

* Celestino Caballero

* Jhonny Gonzalez

* Adrien Broner

* Anselmo Moreno

* Abner Mares

* Joseph Agebko

If Donaire can face and beat all those guys, he’ll be on his way to becoming the next Pacquiao. But he’ll have to then move up to lightweight, light welterweight and welterweight to accomplish the same things Pacquiao has.