On December 8, the same day that Uncle Bob Arum turns age 78, Coach Freddie Roach’s Number Two “Son” Amir Khan turns a ripe, old 23.
I was able to meet and greet the precocious British star on my recent sojourn to Roach’s College of Boxing Knowledge, the Wild Card Gym in Hollywood, and found him to be both personable and highly professional.
On his upcoming birthday, Khan and Roach figure to be celebrating the Bolton lad’s first successful world title defense.
Unless kosher lightning strikes twice in boxing in less than a month apart, I’m among those skeptical that light hitting Jewish Non Jolter Dmitriy Salita can upset Khan in the UK and thus join the exclusive world champions club that his Brooklyn buddy, the rabbinical student Yuri Foreman became part of by thumping Daniel Santos on the Pacquiao-Cotto undercard.
It continues to be an embarrassment of riches for Roach. In Pacman, he tutors the world’s reigning and defending Pound for Pound champ uber alles.
It’s premature to put Khan on any Pound for Pound list but it is going to take a formidable fighter to hand him a defeat like the quick blastout Breidis Prescott handed him.
In retrospect, the fall from grace against the Colombian’s thunderous punches may turn out to be the best thing to happen to Khan.
Adversity or I should say handling adversity is the trademark of durable champions, the guys who retain their titles through one title defense after another.
Some wrote Kid Khan off abruptly when he got flattened by Prescott but, instead of whining about his fate, Khan took control of his career.
He made up his mind to come to America to work under Roach and to get the superior sparring he could only import to England.
Khan’s father and brother live with him in Los Angeles so it’s not as though he’s a lonely soul in California.
The move to the Wild Card also removed the daily pressure of the British media and public from Khan’s daily focus.
You have to remember that the UK”s big newspapers are national ones, mostly tabloids and their headlines aren’t just loud, they scream at the reader.
But Khan has more ideas about America than just laboring in Roach’s ring laboratory. He is determined to fight over here which will just make him all the more attractive to top US TV paymaster HBO.
If Khan fights in Las Vegas which he is bound to do down the line, HBO doesn’t have the time difference problem it does for bouts in Europe.
Khan may wind up as the centerpiece of the bubbling HBO junior welterweight tournament.
Winning fights in America won’t hurt his profile back home, it will only burnish his shining star.
Prescott momentarily knocked his head off his shoulders but Khan has had the gumption and the grit to unscramble that egg.
Wouldn’t it be seamless if, and I say if, as Pacquiao is ready to ride off into the sunset, Roach’s Number Two Son is ready assume the position.
What position?
The Pound for Pound crown, of course.
With the roll that Trainer of the Decade Roach is on, I wouldn’t bet against it.
