By Scott Gilfoid: #4 WBC Luke Campbell (15-1, 12 KOs) has the style to do well against WBC lightweight champion Mikey Garcia (36-0, 30 KOs), according to British promoter Eddie Hearn. Campbell, 5’9”, wants to fight for a world title, but he’s now faced with the reality where Garcia could soon by holding the WBA and WBC lightweight titles, as he’s likely going to be fighting the winner of the March 25 fight between Anthony Crolla and WBA champion Jorge Linares.
If Campbell wants to fight for a world title, he’s going to need to likely go through Garcia or go in another dangerous direction against the 5’11” IBF champion Robert Easter Jr. That’s a bad match-up for Campbell.
There’s also WBO champion Terry Flanagan but I don’t think that’s a fight that can be made. Besides, Flanagan is going to be fighting Felix Verdejo this summer, and he’s probably going to lose that fight.
Campbell has already been beaten by Yvan Mendy by a 12 round split decision on December 12, 2015. That was a fight in which Campbell tasted the canvas in the 5th round after Mendy planted him with a left hook to the head. Since then, Campbell has had three easy mismatches in beating Gary Sykes, Argenis Mendez, and Derry Matthews. Campbell won the WBC Silver lightweight title in beating Mendez on July 30 last year.
“It’s a tough route,” Hearn said to skysports.com. “Garcia looked sensational. The winner of Linares-Crolla is supposed to fight Mikey Garcia, a huge fight, very tough fight. Again, it seems like everywhere you go in those lower divisions at the moment, they are all tough fights. Of all the lightweights out there, I think Campbell is probably one of the best styles to do well against Garcia,” said Hearn.
Well, if Hearn REALLY believes that Campbell matches up well against Mikey Garcia, then he needs to keep him on the path to challenge the talented American for his WBC strap. I don’t think Hearn will. If you look at the type of fights Hearn likes to make for the fighters in his Matchroom Sport stable, he tends to put together fights that favor his own fighters.
In other words, Hearn’s fighters tend to be the ones that are the winners on paper. Hearn isn’t going to likely make a fight between Campbell and Garcia unless he has no choice. If Garcia wins the WBA title, then Hearn won’t have much choice. If Hearn matches Campbell against Robert Easter Jr. for his IBF title, it’s going to be just as bad for him as it would if he fought the 5’7” Mikey Garcia.
Heck, you can argue that Easter Jr. is a taller version of Garcia, because he’s about just as powerful and much harder to hit due to his long height and reach advantage. When Easter Jr. sits down on his punches, he’s every bit as powerful as Mikey Garcia in my view. There are no good options for Campbell for a sure thing win in a title match.
Campbell will have a lot of problems if he moves up to 140, because he’s not going to beat WBC/WBO light welterweight champion Terence Crawford. Hearn probably wouldn’t want to put Campbell in against his own fighter WBA champion Ricky Burns, because there’s no net gain in making that fight. Even if Campbell beat Burns, it would only be a case of one Hearn fighter being swapped out for another one as the WBA champion. I think Hearn is more into having as many of his fighters holding titles as possible rather than having them cancel each other out. Campbell pretty much has to stay at lightweight, because there’s no easy marks at lightweight other than Burns and Julius Indongo, who are about to fight in a unification fight.
“Technically very good, very sharp, he’s not just going to walk in carelessly to shots. Garcia is not really going to walk him down,” said Hearn about Campbell.” I just think technically that’s a very good fight – so is Crolla against Garcia, or Linares against Garcia.”
Of course, Garcia is going to walk Campbell down. Is Hearn kidding? We recently saw Campbell get dropped by Argenis Mendez last July. If Mendez hadn’t suddenly stopped throwing punches after he dropped Campbell in round2, he would have likely knocked him out in the next round. If a shopworn fighter like Mendez was able to drop Campbell, then what do you think Mikey Garcia will do to him? It’ll be a total mismatch from the word go. I’d be surprised if Hearn makes that fight, because he’s got to know that Campbell will be out of his depth against Mikey. It’s a mismatch on paper.
Campbell will be fighting this month in defending his WBC Silver lightweight title against Jairo Lopez (21-6, 14 KOs) on February 25 at the Ice Arena in Hull. Campbell will likely win this fight, but that’s not surprising. Lopez has lost 3 out of his last 6 fights. He’s not exactly someone with a record to be fighting for any kind of world title, even the WBC Silver strap that Campell has in his possession. In the last three years, Lopez has lost to Nagy Saguilan, Dante Jordon, Juan Jose Martinez and Rodolfo Flores. Lopez has won his last three fights in beating Edgar Puerta, Sergio Puente and Edgar Puerta. Yeah, he fought the same guy twice for some reason after having already beaten him.
Campbell will beat Lopez, but it doesn’t mean he’s going to beat Mikey Garcia or even be competitive with him. Garcia’as destruction of Dejan Zlaticanin recently showed how good he is, and I don’t see anyone in the lightweight division that can compete with him right now.