Your random thoughts ...
Junior welterweight titlist
Amir Khan remains on the hunt for an opponent for an April 16 fight in his native England. HBO will air it in the United States, and it will be a pay-per-view on Sky Box Office in the U.K.
For the past few weeks, since Khan's exciting unanimous decision win against
Marcos Maidana last month, Khan's camp and Golden Boy have been discussing potential opponents -- even though there is a blatantly obvious one, whom Khan says he's not interested in.
I have heard a litany of names, including
Lamont Peterson, who got a draw instead of the loss he deserved against
Victor Ortiz on Khan's last undercard; Irishman
Paul McCloskey, the European champion with a thin résumé who is utterly unknown in the United States; and England's
John Murray, the European lightweight champion with a great record (30-0) who has beaten nobody and also is unknown to the American audience.
Funny, but the one name in which the Khan camp refuses to genuinely show interest is the one that makes the most sense: Colombian banger
Breidis Prescott. Maybe that's because he's the guy who knocked Khan stiff in 54 seconds in 2008 -- Khan's only defeat.
Why not fight Prescott again? Khan should want to tidy up that disaster and set the record straight by avenging his loss in what is supposed to be an "in-between fight" -- meaning a match with a slightly lesser opponent on the heels of the high-profile and tough fight with Maidana and before a potential summer blockbuster fight with the winner of next week's
Devon Alexander-
Timothy Bradley Jr. unification fight.
Prescott and his people are rightly pressing for the rematch. He figures that he beat Khan once, he can do it again.
"What does it tell you that he'd go around me, the man who beat him, to instead face a much lighter-hitting and unknown fighter he thinks he can beat?" Prescott said of Khan possibly facing McCloskey. "Obviously, Amir Khan and his team realize I would knock him out if we fought again."
Said
Leon Margules, Prescott's co-promoter: "This could become a public relations disaster for Khan. Lamont Peterson priced himself out of a fight with Khan, so instead of looking for redemption against my guy, Khan's team is trying to sell a probable mismatch victory for their guy against McCloskey to the television networks. Fighting Peterson instead of Prescott was questionable. Fighting McCloskey is just an obvious admission. They know they can't beat my guy."
Instead of looking to Prescott, Khan ridiculously claims that he has "slipped off his radar." The reality is that, after the way Prescott knocked him out, Prescott is probably never far from Khan's mind. Maybe that's the reason he seems to want nothing to do with him again.
Prescott (23-2, 19 KOs) has won his last two fights, is known to American fight fans because of his numerous appearances on ESPN2 and is surely known to fans in England after wiping the floor with Khan. And there is the built-in revenge storyline that would undoubtedly drive media attention and the television audience, especially on pay-per-view in England.
"Amir, I remain ready, willing and able to give you a rematch," Prescott said. "I won't price myself out of the fight. You'll have no trouble selling it to TV. Stop this running and do what the fans want you to do and what your legacy as a great fighter demands that you do: Fight me."
I couldn't agree more.
Khan should look no further than what countryman
Lennox Lewis, the great former heavyweight champion, did:. When he got knocked out by
Oliver McCall and
Hasim Rahman, he faced them again in rematches and turned the tables.
Khan should do the same thing. Then, and only then, can he let Prescott slip off his radar.
• I am mildly intrigued by the talk of an HBO fight between titleholder
Andre Berto and Ortiz, if for no other reason than Ortiz is a far more compelling opponent for Berto than any of his recent foes.
• Gotta give credit to HBO for what looks like a very strong start to 2011. Bradley-Alexander is next week, and the
Fernando Montiel-
Nonito Donaire bantamweight title bout headlines its second card on Feb. 19. If you asked me for a list of the top 10 fights I wanted to see in 2011, both would have been on it.
• Full respect to
John Duddy for retiring when he felt he didn't have what it took anymore to give boxing his all. It's a tough sport. Better to get out a fight or two too soon than one too late. Duddy wasn't the best boxer in the world, but he always gave it his all. He was respectful to the fans, press, his opponents and the sport. If you bought a ticket to one of his fights, you never left feeling cheated out of your money.
• For the record, I happen to think
Winky Wright-
Matthew Macklin is a pretty interesting fight that adds depth to the April 9 pay-per-view card Golden Boy is putting on. Wright hasn't fought for two years, and because he's a little older now I think he'll have to stand and fight more than he usually has done. Macklin is a legitimate top-10 middleweight on an 11-fight winning streak. He's worth American fans taking a look at.
• The fight isn't made just yet -- and might not come off at all -- but I love the idea of the proposed "Friday Night Fights" junior middleweight main event between
Joel "Love Child" Julio and
Delvin Rodriguez. Terrific fight -- and probably the end of the road for the loser. I hope it gets made.
• How much more of the sanctioning-body nonsense must we take? Here's the latest example of the insanity that has overtaken these disgusting organizations: The WBO, challenging the putrid WBC and horrific WBA for pound-for-pound most-heinous honors, actually recognizes two interim titleholders in the junior flyweight division --
Ramon Garcia and
Jesus Geles. And on Feb. 5, they will meet in what will be, as far as I know, a first: an interim unification bout. The madness continues. Vomit bags for everyone!
• Congratulations to my pal
Steve Farhood for winning the
Nat Fleischer lifetime award for excellence in boxing journalism from the Boxing Writers Association of America. Now, if only he would take me behind the numbers. Most folks around boxing know Farhood for his role as a Showtime analyst, but he also has spent 32 years writing about boxing. He launched KO Magazine, served as editor of Ring magazine from 1989 to 1997 and still writes regularly for England's Boxing Monthly.
• Paging
Dmitry Pirog.
• Why is
Arthur Abraham taking a so-called "tuneup" fight next month before his Super Six semifinal against
Andre Ward? Abraham has lost two fights in a row and looked terrible in both of them. Is beating a second-rate opponent supposed to make anyone believe he can beat Ward? And what if he loses again or gets hurt? I don't get it.
• What a star-studded couple of weeks for birthdays. Shoutouts to "The Greatest,"
Muhammad Ali, who turned 69, and a trio of future Hall of Famers, all of whom had big days --
Bernard Hopkins (46),
Roy Jones Jr. (42) and
Marco Antonio Barrera (37).
•
DVD pick of the week: For no apparent reason, I woke up at around 4 a.m. Wednesday. Couldn't even blame the cats. So I went downstairs to my office and randomly picked out a fight DVD to watch. I made a great pick. It happened to be of an HBO PPV fight I covered March 17, 2007, at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. I watched
Juan Manuel Marquez move from featherweight to junior lightweight to win a unanimous decision and claim a title from Barrera, his Mexican countryman. They both let it all hang out in an outstanding fight. The seventh round was the most memorable. Marquez seemed to take command when he hurt Barrera and staggered him multiple times. He looked like he might get the knockout, but Barrera rallied and nailed Marquez on the chin with a right hand. He went down, and Barrera hit him while he was on his knees. Stunningly, referee
Jay Nady did not call a knockdown after the perfectly clean shot, while docking Barrera a point for the foul. It turned out not to matter in the scoring. Marquez would go on to greater glory and eventually win the lightweight championship he still holds today. The fight was the last time Barrera -- who also lost his next fight, to
Manny Pacquiao -- looked good.
