By Dan Ambrose: Danny Garcia (32-0, 18 KOs) won’t have long to enjoy his new WBC welterweight title before he’s forced to defend the belt. According to the World Boxing Council, Garcia has until June to defend his new title against his #1 WBC mandatory challenger Amir Khan.
If Garcia chooses not to face Khan, then he will likely be stripped of the title unless his adviser Al Haymon can work out a deal that will allow Garcia to sidestep Khan for whatever reason.
The only way I could see that happening is if Garcia fights a unification fight against one of the other champions at 147, which would seem very unlikely. IBF champion Kell Brook has a fight scheduled on March 26 against Kevin Bizier and WBA champion Keith Thurman will be fighting Shawn Porter on March 12. It would be asking a lot of them to hop back into training camp immediately after their fights to get ready for a unification fight against Garcia before three months’ time.
This is good news for Khan if he wants to fight for the WBC title against Garcia bad enough. It’s hard to know what Khan’s intentions are though, because he has the option of getting a tremendous $10 million payday against IBF welterweight champion Kell Brook on June 4 at Wembley Stadium in London, UK, if he wants that fight.
Khan been saying lately that Brook and his promoter Eddie Hearn don’t want to take the fight. However, it looks like Khan is asking for too big of a cut. Khan is rumored to be asking for an 80-20 split of the revenue for the fight. Hearn is said to be offering 60-40.
Khan won’t get that kind of a cut against Garcia, and the money will be considerably less than $10 million. The only reason why Khan could face someone like Garcia instead of Brook is to pick up the WBC title and avenge his loss from four years ago to him. Khan was knocked out by Garcia in 2012 in a 4th round stoppage loss.
“I am now where I believe I belong as a two-division world champion,” Garcia said via the dailymail.co.uk. “And having beaten Khan once, I can beat him again. Although after being inactive for almost a year he would be a fool to take me on straightaway.”
If Khan wants the title shot against Garcia for his WBC title, he’ll likely get the fight. It’s doubtful that the WBC will give Garcia the option of taking one or two voluntary defenses like they’re letting WBC middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez take before he makes a decision whether to face his #1 WBC challenger Gennady Golovkin or not. It’s in the WBC’s best interest to have the Khan-Garcia fight take place, because it could end with Khan winning the title. Having Khan as a champion would be a big deal. He would be able to setup big money unification fights against the other champions. Danny Garcia doesn’t have the same option of fighting Kell Brook in a unification fight where he would be getting $10 million like Khan.
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