By Edward Chaykovsky
In an interview last month, strength and conditioning coach Justin Fortune, who works with WBO welterweight champion Manny Pacquiao, said he was confident that rising welterweight contender Jeff Horn (16-0-1, 11KOs) would beat former world champion Jessie Vargas (27-2, 10KOs).
Back in September, Top Rank's CEO Bob Arum signed a deal with Duco Events to co-promote Horn.
Arum would like to build up Horn to the point of fighting Top Rank's superstar, Pacquiao. To properly build that fight, Arum would like to match Horn against one of Pacquaio's most recent opponents, Vargas or former two division champ Timothy Bradley.
Arum was ringside last month in Auckland, and watched Horn blow away former world champion Ali Funeka - with the fight taking place as the co-featured attraction to the Joseph Parker-Andy Ruiz heavyweight title fight.
Fortune believes Horn, in securing a win over Vargas, would prove his worth for a Pacquiao fight. He says Bradley, because of his fighting style, would be a tougher ask for Horn.
“I think Jeff Horn will beat Vargas,’’ said Fortune to Fox Sports. “If he can beat one of those guys he will prove that he deserves to be in the ring with Manny.
“Tim Bradley would be a tougher fight than Vargas. Bradley is very slick and calculating, Vargas is a good boxer but he doesn’t do anything special and he’s not what you’d call a great puncher either.’’
Horn agrees with Fortune and saw nothing special about Vargas after watching his decision loss to Pacquiao in November.
“I watched Pacquiao’s fight with Vargas and I thought Pacquiao easily outboxed him,” Horn said to Fox Sports. “Vargas is a very basic fighter. He’s tough but he doesn’t do anything special. He just stands right in front of you with a long jab and right hand. If I was fighting Pacquiao I would move a lot more than Vargas did and give Pacquiao different angles the same way he did to Vargas.”
“At the moment we’re training to be ready for anyone at any time. If we get the date to fight Vargas straight away we’ll be ready and if we get the chance to take a fight before that it’s even better.’’
But the true prize for Horn would the Pacquiao showdown. And he would love for the fight to take place in Brisbane’s Suncorp Stadium.
“To get a fight with Pacquiao would be a dream come true,’’ Horn said, “especially if it was at Suncorp. A couple of years ago it would have been like a dream just to meet Pacquiao but now to get the chance to take his world title is amazing. Things have certainly moved quickly for me in the last couple of years."