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For some reasons, many of you American fans seem to think that us British fans see Amir Khan as being the next coming of God himself. The vast majority of us educated fans (ie the ones who could name some champions in his weight division) recognise that he is not ready for a title shot year. He wants one, but ALL fighters want a title shot. He's young, he's impetuous, he wants to win things and make money and fight the best. Everyone does. Its his promoter and his manager's job to scale that back. We all know that his level of competition is not high, we know that he's quite protected. Thats the right strategy to take, he's still a young and inexperienced fighter. You build him up, you pick fights to work on his strengths and weaknesses. You dont throw him straight into the ring with people who can knock him out. He's still only had 17 fights and he started fighting very young. We also all know that his defence is weak, that he takes silly punches and that his chin is not too strong yet. He's still a growing lad, that could change, though I doubt it.
We recognise all this about him and this is why very few of us are claiming him to be a world-beater now. None of us are putting him on the P4P list. None of us are saying that he's the best in his weight division. Very few of us are even saying that he deserves a title-shot in his next fight. This is exactly why he is not 'over-rated', or 'over-hyped'. Seeing incredible potential in someone is not over-hyping him, nor over-rating him. He has the attributes to fulfil that potential, we just need to wait and see.
And this is the problem. Many of you guys arent willing to wait and see, you want to dismiss him now because he has been knocked down a couple of times (despite him coming back and winning those fights, showing a great fighting heart and a good attitude). He's not over-rated by us on here (maybe by the general public, but what the **** do they know? We only get maybe 5 fights a year on terrestrial television and 4 of them will be Khan, they dont know anything about boxers), he's underrated by those of you who claim that he'll never have it in him to be a champion. He's underrated by those who say he's protected and a bum and fail to recognise his incredible raw materials like his blistering handspeed, strength and ability to pick punches and land combinations. You dont even have the excuse of ignorance like the general public who think that he's the best boxer in the world, because you're all educated on boxing, thats why you're here.
Wise up. Khan is what he is, an unbeaten, filled with potential, vulnerable and young contender with a long way to go but the tools to be able to do it. Selling out 10,000 tickets at his age, with 17 fights under his belt is ****ing impressive, that cannot be denied.
We recognise all this about him and this is why very few of us are claiming him to be a world-beater now. None of us are putting him on the P4P list. None of us are saying that he's the best in his weight division. Very few of us are even saying that he deserves a title-shot in his next fight. This is exactly why he is not 'over-rated', or 'over-hyped'. Seeing incredible potential in someone is not over-hyping him, nor over-rating him. He has the attributes to fulfil that potential, we just need to wait and see.
And this is the problem. Many of you guys arent willing to wait and see, you want to dismiss him now because he has been knocked down a couple of times (despite him coming back and winning those fights, showing a great fighting heart and a good attitude). He's not over-rated by us on here (maybe by the general public, but what the **** do they know? We only get maybe 5 fights a year on terrestrial television and 4 of them will be Khan, they dont know anything about boxers), he's underrated by those of you who claim that he'll never have it in him to be a champion. He's underrated by those who say he's protected and a bum and fail to recognise his incredible raw materials like his blistering handspeed, strength and ability to pick punches and land combinations. You dont even have the excuse of ignorance like the general public who think that he's the best boxer in the world, because you're all educated on boxing, thats why you're here.
Wise up. Khan is what he is, an unbeaten, filled with potential, vulnerable and young contender with a long way to go but the tools to be able to do it. Selling out 10,000 tickets at his age, with 17 fights under his belt is ****ing impressive, that cannot be denied.
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