From welterweight January to lightweight February!

Last month was the month of the welterweights, as we witnessed Andre Berto's too close for comfort title defense against Luis Collazo and Shane Mosley's title winning upset of Antonio Margarito.

This month, however, we will be seeing three of the best lightweights in the world in action on HBO. This Satuday night, IBF/IBO lightweight champion Nate Campbell will put his titles on the line against Ali Funeka in a stylistically appealing match up. Campbell hasn't seen any action since winning the belts in a crowd pleasing split decision defeat of Juan Diaz in Mexico last March. Funeka earned his title shot with Campbell in an IBF eliminator last July, stopping highly regarded Zahir Raheem, who once beat Erik Morales, in four rounds.

On February 28, we will see lightweight kingpin Juan Manuel Marquez defend his title against Diaz, the man Campbell beat less than a year ago. Marquez won the lightweight championship of the world with an 11th round TKO of Joel Casamayor last September. Diaz rebounded nicely from the loss to Campbell with a twelve decision win over Michael Katsidis in Houston, also back in September. Marquez is clearly the recognized lightweight champion of the world, but Campbell is a titleholder who happens to be the universally recognized number one contender to Marquez's throne. Diaz is one of the top lightweights in the world himself; his fight with Marquez figures to be a classic in the making.

Campbell vs Funeka is being promoted by Don King Productions and will be televised on HBO Boxing After Dark, while Marquez vs Diaz will be represented under the Golden Boy Promotions banner and will air live on HBO World Championship Boxing. What's great about these two boxing events is that they are being televised on HBO and not some over hyped PPV card. HBO subscribers can view both of these fights, which feature best lightweights in the world pretty evenly matched against one another.