By Jim Dower: Former International Boxing Federation (IBF) light welterweight champion Paulie Malignaggi (25-2, 5 KOs) will be making a comeback bout against Christopher Fernandez (16-6-1, 9 KOs) on the undercard of the WBC super middleweight title bout between champion Carl Froch vs. Jermain Taylor at the Foxwoods Resort Casino, in Mashantucket, Connecticut. Malignaggi, 28, was beaten into submission by Ricky Hatton in an 11th round TKO loss in November 2008.
The defeat was the first time in Malignaggi’s eight-year pro career that he was taken out. Although in fairness to Malignaggi, his corner stopped the fight due to him taking a lot of punishment in the 11th from Hatton. Malignaggi didn’t like being stopped and felt he should have been allowed to continue fighting until the end.
It’s hard to disagree with him on that because Malignaggi looked he could have easily lasted until the end of the 12th without being stopped, but it good that he wasn’t allowed to because Malignaggi was taking a lot of punishment from Hatton and wasn’t competitive in the least.
Despite losing to Hatton, Malignaggi is ranked at number #8 in the IBF, and if he can get one or two significant wins he could find himself in a title bout against IBF champion Juan Urango. However, there’s some tough fighters ranked ahead of him in Hatton, Randall Bailey, Victor Ortiz and Nate Campbell. Beating any one of them would be a monumental task for Malignaggi because of their huge power.
Malignaggi is more of a slickster and gets his wins by landing fast combinations and making his opponents miss. Malignaggi might be able to make a big puncher like Bailey miss for several rounds, but eventually he’s going to land and when that happens I doubt that Malignaggi will still be standing.
Ortiz and Campbell would probably bludgeon Malignaggi into submission with heavy shots all night long and eventually stop him. For that reason, it might be better off for Malignaggi to consider moving down in weight to the lightweight division. Down there, Malignaggi would have a much better chance of beating tough but flawed fighters like Michael Katsidis, Edwin Valero, Juan Diaz and Ali Funeka.
I honestly don’t know whether Malignaggi has what it takes to beat those guys, because it would take a good offense to beat any of them. However, it seems better for Malignaggi to face them rather than to stay at light welterweight and have to deal with facing big punchers like Ortiz, Bailey and Campbell.
Those are all losses for Malignaggi as far as I can tell. He might be able to hang with them for a little while but eventually they’ll beat him down in the same way that Hatton did.
If Malignaggi can get by Fernandez on April 25th, then Malignaggi may be fighting number #9 ranked WBO contender Mike Alvarado next. That would be an excellent fight for Malignaggi because Alvarado, a good puncher, seems tailor made for Malignaggi. Alvarado has a great right hand but he doesn’t have the speed or the defensive ability that Malignaggi has.
It would be a good win but I don’t know what it would accomplish long term, because presumably Malignaggi will have to beat a better fighter than him to get another title shot and I don’t see that happening for Paulie.
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