If Floyd Mayweather can find justification or a way out of his commitment to face Manny Pacquiao on May 2, chances are he might pick Amir Khan over the Filipino star as his next opponent for a less risky fight.
For a quite a while, Khan has sought the lucrative Mayweather fight but the unbeaten American has opted to face less risky opponents in what seems to be his own way of preserving his unblemished career record. Although Khan has fully recovered from his TKO loss to Danny Garcia in 2012 with his four straight victories, Mayweather has downplayed Khan’s credential saying he needs to show more in order to earn the fight. Now that Khan has performed impressively against Devon Alexander with a unanimous decision victory, Mayweather can make a good case for a possible box office fight in Khan’s home court in England. The problem is that Mayweather has made the public believe that he has finally decided to pick Pacquiao for his next fight. To abort the nearly done deal with Pacquiao following his announcement that he wants the eight-division champ on May 2, Mayweather needs to justify his move for a way out or he gets massive public protest and rejection for his misleading statements. His credibility or whatever is left of it will suffer if he cannot present a good case to the public for a sudden change in his recently-announced decision to finally face Pacquiao in the ring after five years of failed talks. If indeed it is true that Mayweather is afraid to face Pacquiao in the ring for fear of losing his unblemished record, then he needs to find a credible way out of the Pacquiao fight. It appears though that there is no way out from the Pacquiao fight at this time because his statement accepting Pacquiao’s challenge and setting a date for the fight to happen are now of public knowledge following his televised announcement. Fighting Khan would be less risky for Mayweather if his primary concern is to preserve his unblemished record. But Mayweather should realize that a win over Pacquiao would boost his credibility as the world’s best pound-for-pound fighter. Given the choice, Mayweather will most likely preserve his unbeaten record with Khan but will gain more by giving Pacquiao a boxing lesson by sticking to his commitment to fight the Filipino star on May 2.
