By Dan Ambrose: Dan Rafael is reporting that former IBF welterweight champion Paul Williams (39-2, 27 KO’s) will be facing junior middleweight contender Nobuhiro Ishida (23-6-2, 8 KO’s) on July 9th on HBO. The fight, oddly enough, will be a main event fight and that’s hard to believe given Williams’ recent 2nd round knockout loss to Sergio Martinez in his last fight. You would think that Williams needs to work his way back to a main event fight rather than getting a choice position by HBO against a still mostly unknown Ishida.

For boxing fans who aren’t familiar with Ishida, he’s the fighter that destroyed an overweight and rusty James Kirkland in a 1st round knockout win in April. Ishida jumped out fast and threw a flurry of quick shots that had Kirkland bouncing up and down on the canvas like a rubber ball. All total, Ishida dropped Kirkland three times in the fight before it was finally stopped by referee Joe Cortez.

However, Ishida is far from a knockout artist and the win appears to be a fluke. Williams and his promoter obviously want to take advantage of this by getting a win over a guy that has a little bit of a name because of the Kirkland fight. The last thing that Williams needs right now is another puncher after getting knocked cold by Martinez in his last fight in November 2010. Williams made the mistake of going after the hard hitting Martinez and not respecting his power.

Williams paid for that mistake by getting clipped with a big left hand from Martinez that sent Williams down on the canvas where he laid with his eyes wide open despite being out cold. With a knockout that bad, it wouldn’t be wise for Williams to be in with a big puncher right now. Ishida obviously is going to come out fast and hard and look to throw some serious leather in the first three rounds to test Williams’ chin.