Saturday night at the Convention Center in Washington D.C., Lamont Peterson will face Amir Khan for the IBF and WBA light welterweight titles. In a rare instance where home field advantage resides with the lesser name, Peterson, a D.C. native, will try to electrify his fans by upsetting the heavily-favored British star.
Peterson, 29-1-1, has shown himself to be a credible contender. Using crafty inside work supplemented by a sharp body attack, he fought Victor Ortiz to a draw last December. An artiste in shoulder-to-shoulder combat, he showcases uppercuts to the sternum and left hooks to the liver while remaining slippery enough to avoid the bulk of the return. It?s the type of inside proficiency that made Timothy Bradley ?an accomplished body puncher himself?revert to using his feet through two-thirds of his win over Peterson two years ago.
But Bradley?s versatility exposed some of Peterson?s vulnerabilities. While Peterson applied enough pressure to make Bradley uncomfortable, he didn?t cut the ring off well enough to definitively bag rounds. He also showed a tendency to fall into lulls for minutes at a time. A pressure fighter doesn?t have to be a windmill for 180 seconds of every round, but a jab disrupts a moving target while filling in the gaps between concerted attacks, and Peterson lacks a consistent one. His July knockout victory over Victor Cayo, while emphatic, highlighted these shortcomings.
