By Eric Thomas: WBA World welterweight champion Paulie Malignaggi (31-4, 7 KO’s) is still hoping he can land a rematch against Ricky Hatton at some point in the near future if Hatton suddenly decides to start showing some interested in fighting him. As of now, however, Hatton has a fight date scheduled on November 24th against an opponent still to be determined in Manchester, England. And for his part, the 31-year-old Malignaggi will be making his first defense of his World Boxing Association 147 pound title against #11 WBA welterweight contender Pablo Cesar Cano (25-1-1, 19 KO’s) at the Barclays Center, in Brooklyn, New York.
Cano, 22, has never fought before at welterweight but that hasn’t stopped the World Boxing Association from giving him a ranking for this fight. Cano is a decent fighter but still very, very young and green to be fighting for a world title. Oddly enough, this is the second time that Cano has fought for a world title. Las year he was beaten up and stopped by Erik Morales by a 10th round stoppage in a fight for the vacant WBC light welterweight title.
There are obviously much better fighters than Cano to challenge for a title, then again that defeats the purpose of him being chosen in the first place. Cano was selected because he’s got an impressive record at first glance, and that he’ll give a good performance in losing. He’s not in the class of higher ranked welterweight contenders Kell Brook, Thomas Dulorme and Marcos Maidana, but then again those guys would likely beat Malignaggi. That’s not what Golden Boy Promotions likely wants. They want Malignaggi to stay the WBA champion, and if they were to put him in with a better fighter like Cano, he wouldn’t stay a champion for long.
Malignaggi defeated former WBA welterweight champion Vyacheslav Senchenko by a 9th round stoppage last April to capture the World Boxing Association 147 lb title. It was a very good performance from Malignaggi because he proved that he can beat a good champion with excellent boxing skills and power. At the end of the day, Senchenko was too stiff to handle Malignaggi’s much more modern fighting style.