Legendary fictitious heavyweight Rocky Balboa once said, “If you know what you’re worth, then go out and get what you’re worth.” Amir “King” Khan has taken that advice in hopes of producing his Hollywood ending.
For years, Khan has attempted to land the big fight that would show his “worth” to the boxing world. After failed efforts to get a fight with boxing’s biggest names including Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao, Khan finally had to challenge himself by jumping two weight classes to get his big name opponent, WBC middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez.
Alvarez (46-1-1, 32 KOs) represents the opportunity for Khan to achieve the household recognition and stardom he has been striving to make since early in his professional career. However, Alvarez also represents a significant challenge as the 29-year-old from Bolton, England has never fought past 147 pounds and has failed to impress in his four fights as a welterweight.
In an interview with Sky Sports, Khan expressed that he has been waiting for a chance like this for awhile and is ready to seize the opportunity no matter how difficult the obstacle in front of him.
“It’s going to be amazing to be called the middleweight world champion, and that’s like a dream come true,” Khan proclaimed.
Khan is 100% confident that not only will he defeat Alvarez on May 7th, despite being an underdog for the first time in his 34 previous fights as a professional, but that his performance will be the defining moment of his career.
“Even though I achieved a lot in my amateur days and went to the Olympics and also as a professional becoming a two-weight world champion, I still think winning this fight against such a big name in Canelo, and becoming the middleweight champion, will be bigger than anything I’ve done,” Khan said.
Khan (31-3, 19 KOs) also disregards the belief that he is too small to become the middleweight champion when asked by Sky Sports and points to boxing history as a benchmark.
“I know it can happen because we’ve seen it happen in the past when Sugar Ray Leonard took on Marvin Hagler,” said Khan. “He was in a very similar position to me, where people were saying he was going to get beaten up, get knocked out and get hurt. He was going up two divisions, and he went in there and beat Marvin Hagler.”
Khan is so assured of victory that he feels he will be placed on the same elite level as Leonard following the fight with Alvarez. “Sugar Ray Leonard was a great, great fighter but I really believe this is going to take me up to another level,” he said.
You can watch Khan dare-to-be-great live from the new T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, NV and broadcast on HBO PPV May 7th.
