Amir Khan boxing news
After his recent, and fourth in a row victory over Devon Alexander (26-3-0), Amir Khan (30-3-0) seems to be back on the paved track to a mega-fight.
After a loss to Lamont Peterson in 2011, and a brutal TKO loss to Danny Garcia in 2012, Khan’s future seemed to be escaping his grasp. In boxing, a couple losses in a row can nosedive a career, weakening a possibility for a huge payday.
Amir Khan didn’t have much luck in getting Floyd Mayweather Jr to agree to fight him, so he’s now he’s put his focus on trying to get the highly popular Manny Pacquiao to face him in 2015. Khan is hopeful that the 36-year-old Pacquiao will say yes to a fight with him, and then agree to fight him in the UK.
Khan would like to stage the Pacquiao fight in the huge 90,000 seat Wembley Stadium in London. Khan obviously believes that the two of them would be able to sell out the stadium in the same way that IBF/WBA super middleweight champion Carl Froch sold out the stadium in 2015 in his rematch with George Groves in May.
Boxing has become a careful “matching” event, where few fighters are protected from getting a loss or a beat down. This is because some promoters don’t want to lose the “zero defeat” status of their cash cows, or the fighters themselves are well aware of who they should not step into the ring with… coward, but a smart business move. Fighters often become a “shell” of themselves by getting into the wrong fights. We have witnessed this with Kelly Pavlik after facing Hopkins, Jeff Lacy after calling out Calzaghe and I believe we are seeing such symptoms in Danny Garcia after the Mathysse and Judah fights. My supporting argument for this claim can be seen in the fight against Mauricio Herrera. It was supposed to be a tune up fight, instead he struggled and many believe he actually lost that match.
Amir Khan is reportedly giving Floyd Mayweather Jr a deadline of mid-January to start the negotiation process or else he’ll start looking at other alternatives for his next fight. Khan has been waiting around for a fight with Mayweather since 2013, and he’s been largely ignored by the popular fighter.
That hasn’t stopped Khan from pursuing him for a fight, but it seems to have backfired because Mayweather has shown little interest in facing the 28-year-old Khan. Either Khan hasn’t been fighting the right guys that would make him a popular enough fighter to interest Mayweather, or there’s some other reason that Mayweather isn’t telling.
Growing up watching Muhammad Ali, Sugar Ray Leonard, Julio Cesar Chavez, Sr., Pernell Whitaker, and a whole host of other great fighters, it is truly agonizing to watch the sport of boxing become a spectacle; not unlike “Dancing with the Stars”. Fighters avoiding their toughest foes and boxing promoters creating a circus-like atmosphere just to boost pay-per-view sales.
Love him or hate him, Floyd Mayweather, Jr. has set the tone for the new breed of fast-talking, cocky, self-promoting fighters. What separates Mayweather from most of his emulating peers is a tremendous skill set and dedication to his craft. Many of today’s young boxing stars lack the skill set to match their boastful banter.
If WBA/WBC welterweight champion Floyd Mayweather Jr winds up facing Amir Khan in early 2015 instead of Manny Pacquiao, Mayweather’s uncle Jeff Mayweather sees Floyd knocking Khan out. He sees Khan as being no problem for Khan because he believes the British fighter still has a chin problem that has followed him pretty much his entire pro career.
Khan’s adviser Al Haymon hasn’t matched him against a puncher since his 4th round knockout loss to Danny Garcia in 2012, so it’s really not surprising that Khan has been able to thrive since then in four fights against non-punchers.
Amir Khan says that besides Floyd Mayweather Jr and Manny Pacquiao, he’d like to add Tim Bradley and Juan Manuel Marquez to the list of guys he wants to face in the near future. Khan has been after a fight against Mayweather for ages now, but he’s not been fighting the preliminary guys that would get him the Mayweather fight unfortunately.
Instead of fighting big punchers like Kell Brook, Keith Thurman and Shawn Porter, Khan has been fighting the likes of Carlos Molina, Julio Diaz, Luis Collazo and Devon Alexander. This has led to Khan not picking up the name recognition in the United States that he needs for him to lure the likes of Mayweather to fight him.
One fight that boxing fans likely won’t be seeing in 2015 is a clash between two of the top British fighters at 147. Amir Khan doesn’t have a world title belt in his possession, but he’s sure acting like he has one.
Khan says he won’t be fighting the highly popular and big punching IBF welterweight champion Kell Brook because he feels that he’s not shown him the type of respect that he wants. If that wasn’t enough of a reason for Khan, he also added that Brook isn’t on the same level as him.
Trainer Floyd Mayweather Sr says he wasn’t impressed with what he saw from Amir Khan in his recent 12 round decision win over Devon Alexander last Saturday night. Floyd Sr says that Khan fought like a woman due to the way he would flail with his arms when coming forward to throw his combinations.
To Floyd Sr, Khan looked like a wild woman, and he saw it as a very undisciplined manner to be fighting. With that said, Floyd Sr still thinks that Khan would present more of a problem for his son Floyd Mayweather Jr than someone like Manny Pacquiao. Floyd Sr thinks that Khan’s high work rate would be more difficult than Pacquiao’s one punch at a time style of landing punches.
Amir Khan bristled at the recent news that Floyd Mayweather Jr said that he’s not worth fighting because his name doesn’t hold value in the United States because the casual boxing fans have no clue who Khan is. Khan feels that he’s more popular than two of Mayweather’s past opponents Victor Ortiz and Robert Guerrero. Khan also says that he’s got a large following in India and Pakistan, and if Mayweather wants to be a global star then he needs to fight him.
I’m not sure that Mayweather cares if Khan has tons of fans in India and Pakistan though, because Mayweather is mainly looking for opponents that are big stars in the United States. That’s where the pay-per-view buys will be coming from, not India or Pakistan.