Victor Cayo willing to fight Maidana if Khan won't

With the rumor of Amir Khan likely to vacate his 140-pound title instead of facing Marcos Maidana picking up steam yesterday, undefeated Dominican prospect Victor Cayo told BoxingScene.com that he's more than happy to step in and fight Maidana should Khan decide he doesn't want to take the risk.

Cayo (24-0, 16 KO) was ranked No. 3 contender -- behind Juan Diaz at No. 2 and a vacant top spot (vacant due to Maidana's interim title status) -- in the last published WBA rankings on their web site for October/November. With Diaz having lost to Malignaggi, Cayo is now the top-ranked contender according the sanctioning body. Sanctioning body rankings are by nature complete garbage (take Kali Meehan as No. 2 WBA heavyweight contender, or Jermain Taylor being ranked ahead of Sakio Bika at 168), but they do affect things like this, and fighters use them for leverage, as they should.

Cayo, 25, picked up the best win of his young career last July, when he beat former 135-pound titlist Julio Diaz on Friday Night Fights. The ten-round unanimous decision win may not mean a ton, really, given that Diaz hasn't looked good in quite a while now, but it did legitimize Cayo's rise, and he's a good, young fighter, and if he fought Maidana for the title, he wouldn't even be among the ten least qualified major title challengers we'll see in 2010. He also just might win.

At 5'11", Cayo is a pretty big junior welterweight, a couple inches taller than Maidana. He also has decent power and has shown some fine boxing ability. I think I'd pick Maidana to win, but I also consider the idea that Maidana is pretty one-dimensional. If you avoid his power, he can be out-boxed.

All things being fair, I'd personally like to see Cayo get at least one more really credible win before getting a title shot, but what can you do? If he gets it, good luck to him. If he doesn't, he doesn't.