By Scott Gilfoid: The World Boxing Organization has reportedly ordered WBO middleweight champion Billy Joe Saunders (24-0, 12 KOs) to begin negotiations with his #1 mandatory challenger Avtandil Khurtsidze (32-2, 21 KOs), according to Fight News. The promoters for the two fighters have 10 days to try and make a deal. If they fail to do so, then the fight will go to a purse bid.
For Saunders, this is not a good fight for him. The timing is terrible. Saunders was talking earlier this week of a big fight on the horizon, which might actually be true if he wins his title defense against Khurtsidze.
The problem that Saunders has is he might not get past Khurtsidze. In fact, I don’t think Saunders is going to get past Khurtsidze. This is like a bigger, stronger, and more aggressive version of Artur Akavov, who Saunders beat by a very, very close 12 round decision last December.
Saunders blamed his poor performance on him being out of the ring for a long time, and him having gained a lot of weight. It looked more like the case of Akavov and his training team having studied Saunders’ best fights against Andy Lee and Chris Eubank Jr. and figured out that he can’t handle pressure over a 12 round fight. Saunders fights well for five rounds, and then faded in the second half of his fights.
If Saunders does this against Khurtsidze, then he’ll not only lose the fight but likely wind up getting knocked out for his troubles. Khurtsidze is an incredible pressure fighter, and very good on the inside.
Just last year it looked like Saunders was going to get a big payday fight against Saul Canelo Alvarez. The Mexican star’s promoters at Golden Boy used his status as the WBO junior middleweight champion as leverage to get Canelo a No.1 ranking at 160. That meant that Canelo could have fought for a world title against Saunders without him having to fight his way to the No.1 spot in the middleweight division.
Canelo and Golden Boy changed their mind about fighting Saunders after they made a deal with Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. for May 6. The money is much better for Canelo to fight Chavez Jr. than it is against Saunders. If Canelo can beat Chavez Jr. and make a lot of cash, then he doesn’t need Saunders’ WBO title as a bargaining tool to get a bigger cut of the revenue for a fight against Golovkin. All Canelo needs to do is point to the big PPV numbers his fight against Chavez Jr. will bring in on HBO, and that will be enough to get his way in the negotiations.
With all the talking that Saunders has done about himself, it sure will be nice to see what he can do against a talented middleweight like Khurtsidze. It’s been a long time since Saunders fought anyone truly good, and I don’t think he’s going to do well. Saunders might want to consider vacating his WBO title rather than taking the fight against Khurtsidze and being seen getting knocked out by the boxing world. Khurtsidze has looked sensational of late with his stoppage win over Antoine Douglas last March. If Saunders loses this fight, then he can forget about Gennady Golovkin or Canelo. That won’t happen.