By Chris Williams: Chris Algieri (20-0, 8 KOs) will be sacrificing his WBO 140 pound title for challenging World Boxing Organization welterweight champion Manny Pacquiao (56-5-2, 38 KOs) next month on November 22nd in Macau, China.
Algieri will be forced to vacate his WBO light welterweight title, according to Dan Rafael of ESPN.com.
This means that Algieri will need to start from scratch if he gets beaten by Pacquiao. Algieri won’t have his WBO 140lb title waiting for him to defend, or even have the option of choosing which title to defend if he gets past Pacquiao on 11/8.
“In a surprise move, the WBO announced that titleholder Chris Algieri, who challenges welterweight titlist Manny Pacquiao on Nov. 22, will have his belt vacated with the commencement of the fight with Pacquiao,” Rafael said.
Algieri might have enough cache to get a big fight for a world title at 140 even if he loses the fight to Pacquiao. Just as long as Algieri doesn’t get beaten too badly by Pacquiao, he might be able to get a shot at one of the light welterweight titles.
Top Rank promoter Bob Arum will likely be interested in matching Algieri against Arum’s fighter Jessie Vargas for his WBA light welterweight title. Vargas is someone who has failed to build a fan base for some reason. It could be that his fighting style is less than crowd-pleasing.
A fight between Algieri and Vargas could be a fight that Arum would be interested in making, even though Algieri isn’t promoted by Top Rank. Arum would make the fight in order to increase Vargas’ popularity to likely set up a fight between Pacquiao and Vargas.
Algieri is going to need to put on a really put on an impressive display on November 22nd, because there’s little chance he’ll be giving a decision over a popular fighter like Pacquiao if the fight is even slightly close. We saw Juan Manuel Marquez fail to get a decision in his first three fights against Pacquiao despite the fact that he appeared to beat him in all three of those fights. Algieri could find himself in the same position as Marquez in losing a controversial decision.
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