By Ammar: Well we finally have the verdict. Floyd Mayweather Jr. (45-0, 26 KO’s) will be fighting Marcos Maidana (35-3, 31 KO’s) on May 3rd at a venue to still be determined. I am not going to get into who will give Mayweather the most trouble. Either fighter will probably lose big time. Maidana will have a hard time landing his crushing blows while Khan would repeatedly get countered and put down a few times during the fight.
Which brings us Khan being snubbed for this fight for what was termed as his “left-overs”. This is false as Maidana has put together an impressive streak of wins over decent competition, punctuated by a recent win over someone who was pegged as the next Mayweather.
Amir Khan recently mentioned that Mayweather is “running scared” or is “avoiding him”. Well, the latter is probably more true than the former. Mayweather did not want to fight Khan because at the end of the day, there was just too much public sentiment against it. Khan has not earned this fight. He does not have the credentials for getting this fight. His performance in his last four bouts has been subpar to say the least. He let the very limited Lamont Peterson beat him, was TKOed by Danny Garcia in 4 rounds, fought and obviously beat an unknown feather-fisted fighter Carlos Molina, and then was floored by a past his prime Julio Diaz in a very close points victory. This is not exactly the type of momentum that positions a fighter to be showcased on PPV against the pound for pound king.
Khan has incessantly talked about Mayweather for as long as I can remember. Yet he has not put in the work to close the deal. Since the Garcia TKO in July 2012, he has only fought twice, both of which were sub-par competition. It was obvious that Khan at the very least should have fought Devon Alexander in December to mitigate the damage to his resume caused by periods of inactivity and a string of unimpressive performances.
So is it all bad for Amir Khan? I would like to think that he can learn from this experience. He should never trust anyone, especially someone as cunning as Mayweather. We have seen Khan get worked up and tricked before with the Garcia’s verbally bamboozling him into a brawl. Khan needs to be smarter inside and outside of the ring. What’s more, Khan has been supposed training with Virgil since October and hopefully that will continue. Earlier this year, we heard rumblings from his trainer Virgil Hunter, who was questioning Khan’s commitment to stay a world-level fighter. You can’t expect to improve when you just show up to train 2 months before a fight. Yes, there is such a things as “over-training”, but with the tactical and defensive flaws that Khan has, he needs to be working around the clock to correct at least some of his
Yes, Khan was advised to skip the Alexander bout, but nothing is set in stone.
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