By Chris Williams: Former IBF/WBA light welterweight champion Amir Khan is picking WBO super bantamweight champion Nonito Donaire (31-1, 20 KO’s) to defeat WBA super bantamweight champion Guillermo Rigondeaux (11-0, 8 KO’s) in their unification bout this month on April 13th at the Radio City Music Hall, in New York, New York, USA.
Khan thinks Donaire is too experienced, has too much heart and is too much of a brute for the much smaller Rigondeaux.
Khan said to philippinenews1 “I don’t think he [Rigondeaux] has what Nonito has. I think he is the best fighter; more of a rugged professional tough guy, and I think that’s what Rigondeaux doesn’t have. He doesn’t have the professional heart. He’s [Donaire] going to go out knowing what to expect. For Rigondeaux, it’s going to be a big step up and I don’t think he’ll be able to keep up with Nonito. I think Nonito will win.”
As much as I like Khan, I don’t think he has a clue about what he’s talking about. Donaire isn’t more rugged than Rigondeaux and how would Khan know whether Rigondeaux has a heart or not. He’s beaten everyone he’s faced, so it’s hard to understand where Khan is coming from with his comments about Rigondeaux lacking heart.
Did he see Rigondeaux get beaten in the amateur ranks that made him question is heart? If so, it would be interesting to know which fight Khan watched because Rigondeaux most of his amateur fights in the process of capturing two gold medals in the Olympics.
As far as I can tell the only thing that I see that Donaire has that would fit into the category for him being rugged is his huge size/weight for the super bantamweight class. He’s huge for the weight class, and it would be interesting to see how Donaire would do against a fighter his own size and weight in the lightweight to light welterweight divisions. Donaire vs. Adrien Broner anyone?
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