By Dan Ambrose: Colombian knockout artist Breidis Prescott is predicting a sixth stoppage victory for WBC middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (46-1-1, 32 KOs) in his fight against Amir “King” Khan (31-3, 19 KOs) on May 7. Prescott expects the 25-year-old Canelo to be too big and too strong for Khan to handle his power.
Prescott knows Khan well from having destroyed him in one round in their fight eight years ago in 2008. In that fight, Prescott dropped Khan hard with a left-right combination in the 1st round. When Khan got back to his feet, Prescott dropped him again and got a stoppage.
Khan was badly hurt in that fight, and he probably should have never gotten back to his feet in the first place. He wasn’t going to be able to survive against the hard hitting Prescott, who was just too powerful for Khan to deal with.
“I think Alvarez could stop him within six rounds,” said Prescott to skysports.com. “Yes it surprised me [that Khan is fighting Canelo], but Amir Khan has a chance because he has the speed. Saul has the strength, so Khan has to be careful and keep using his speed. He’s taking a chance, but it’s going to be a great fight, a hard fight.”
Khan does have a chance, you must admit. But he’s going to need to stay on the move for 12 rounds, and not punch with Canelo. He cannot afford to stop and exchange even for a moment in this fight, because Canelo will be looking to take his head off with one of his left hooks.
Canelo has a good right hand, but his left hook is the punch he uses to hurt his opponents. Khan can probably take Canelo’s jab and right hand shots, but the left hook will be a constant threat to Khan. He cannot let Canelo get near enough to him to land that punch. If he does, it’ll probably be over with for Khan. He’ll get badly hurt and put down.
Canelo is probably too big and strong for Khan to survive. Khan would not be able to clinch Canelo get out of the round the way he did against Marcos Maidana in their fight in 2010 after Khan was badly hurt in the 10th round by a right hand from Maidana.
Khan might have gotten through the Prescott fight without getting knocked out if he hadn’t gone out there trying to punch with Prescott. Khan showed zero respect for Prescott’s power at the start of the fight, and he was immediately staggered by a hard jab from Prescott.
Moments later, Prescott dropped Khan with a one-two combination. Khan looked like he wasn’t all there after getting hit with the jab that he wasn’t expecting to be that powerful. Prescott probably could have dropped Khan with any punch after hurting him with his jab.
“Amir Khan is an excellent fighter. The only reason he has lost is because his jaw doesn’t hold a strong punch – and Saul has a strong punch. But that is the only reason he’s lost fights in the past,” said Prescott.
Khan would still likely have one loss on his record even if he could handle a big shot. Khan lost to Lamont Peterson by a decision, and he was dropped or badly hurt in that fight. Khan just didn’t deal with Peterson’s pressure very well, and spent too much time moving and pushing off rather than fighting. If Khan fights like that against Canelo, he probably won’t win. He might survive by fighting with that style, but he’s not going to win.
Prescott’s career has gone downhill since his loss to Khan. He’s been beaten by Miguel Vasquez, Kevin Mitchell, Paul McCloskey, Mike Alvarado, Terence Crawford, Roberto Garcia and Fredrick Lawson. Some of those defeats were controversial. Prescott appeared to beat McCloskey but found himself on the receiving end of what some boxing fans saw as a hometown decision. Prescott’s defeats against Garcia and Lawson were also controversial. The 32-year-old Prescott is still fighting, and he’s coming off of am 8 round unanimous decision win over Claudinei Lacerda in November of last year.
Prescott is said to be fighting in April against an opponent still to be determined. He’s open to fighting in the UK if there’s any interest from the British promoters in having him come down. Khan said recently on Facebook that he’d like to fight Prescott again. However, that’s not likely to happen at this point. Even if Khan loses to Canelo, his management are going to keep pushing him forward and will likely match him against WBC welterweight champion Danny Garcia.
“I would love to go back to England, because England has always welcomed me with open arms, even after the fight with Amir Khan,” said Prescott.
Prescott might be too dangerous for his own good to be used by one of the British promoters for their fighters unless Prescott is willing to fight a junior middleweight. He’s probably too dangerous to be used to fight welterweights like Frankie Gavin and the like.
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