By Marcus Richardson: Right now the last person you’d think Amir Khan should be fighting at the end of 2012 is WBC welterweight champion Floyd Mayweather Jr. Khan was just beaten fairly convincingly by Lamont Peterson on December 10th and shown to have no ability to fight on the inside in losing a 12 round split decision.
Despite the loss, Khan thinks he can get a fight with Mayweather Jr. at the end of 2012. That would be a shocker if Mayweather was to accept a fight with Khan given his recent loss to Peterson.
Khan told the BBC Sport “Maybe Floyd could be at the end of the year, but at the moment we are looking at Lamont Peterson and if not Peterson, then we are just going to go back to the drawing board and maybe look at a few opponents at 147lbs and start negotiating with them.”
Khan is trying to get a rematch with Peterson right now but not making much progress. Peterson and his team are looking to get a big fight with Manny Pacquiao. It’s a long shot that they get picked, but it’s certainly possible. Peterson may in the end give Khan the rematch he’s been asking for but he also could ignore him and move in another direction.
Khan and Golden Boy Promotions haven’t helped themselves by failing to acknowledge the loss and not giving Peterson any credit for the win. Khan has fluffed up a lot of conspiracy type theories about the Mystery man, the scorecards not being accurate, and the referee not being fair. What it’s done is anger Peterson and his manager to the point where neither of them are eager to fight Khan again just for the way he’s talked.
Khan is probably kidding himself to think he’ll get a fight with Mayweather Jr. in 2012. Mayweather is going to want to see Khan redeem himself against at least one if not two more fighters before he even considers a bout with him. If Khan beat someone good in the welterweight division, he’d help himself immensely in landing the Mayweather fight. But in looking at some of the opponents that Khan been matched up with in the last three years, it’s highly likely that the fighter or fighters he ends up facing when he does move up to welterweight in the near future will have no power to speak of. Khan would likely get put in with someone like a Paulie Malignaggi, Shane Mosley or Jan Zaveck. It’ll probably be someone who can’t hurt him. I think Malignaggi would be the guy. Khan would then take a victory over him and then start calling out Mayweather.