By Keith Idec

James DeGale is not at all pleased with how he fought against Rogelio Medina.

Then again, the IBF super middleweight champion thinks his subpar performance in his victory over Medina is what convinced Badou Jack to fight him.

“One-hundred percent, he is looking at that fight and saying, ‘I’ve got DeGale. He’s lazy. He lays on the ropes. He gets hit pretty easily,’ ” DeGale told BoxingScene.com. “So yeah, I think he’s looking way too deep into that performance. And that’s probably the reason why they took the fight, off that performance.”

Whatever Jack’s reasoning, London’s DeGale (23-1, 14 KOs) is certain the WBC world super middleweight champion has made a mistake by accepting their 168-pound title unification fight, scheduled for January 14 at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York (Showtime).

“Listen, there are levels to boxing,” DeGale said. “Badou Jack is a real good fighter. He’s proven in the past couple fights that he’s a good fighter. But me, on my game – the best Badou Jack and the best James DeGale, I win. I win. I’m too good.

“My record speaks for itself. Olympic [gold medalist in 2008], British, European, IBF world champion, and now I’m about to unify the division. So I love these challenges. And Eddie Hearn, my promoter, he says that I’m a buzz fighter. The big lights, the big arenas and the titles, that’s when you see the best in me and I honestly believe that.”

Sweden’s Jack (20-1-2, 12 KOs) stopped Mexico’s Medina (37-7, 31 KOs) in the sixth round of their fight three years ago in Shelton, Washington. DeGale defeated Medina by sizeable margins on all three scorecards April 30 in Washington, D.C. (117-111, 117-111, 116-112), yet wasn’t as impressive as he was while producing previous 12-round, unanimous-decision defeats of former IBF super middleweight champ Lucian Bute (32-3-1, 25 KOs) and Andre Dirrell (25-2, 16 KOs).

“No disrespect to Medina, but the guy [had] six losses on his record and really, he shouldn’t be going the distance with me,” DeGale said. “I got hit far too easy. But we’ve been working in the gym, me and my coach, Jim McDonnell, and you’re gonna see the difference.

“Again, no disrespect to Medina, but he shouldn’t be going the distance with me. If I’m being honest, he had a real good camp. He had eight weeks notice and he was in fantastic shape, and it was for the world title, so he obviously was gonna be up for it. But I was just disappointed because I made it a competitive fight. And that’s no disrespect to Medina at all.”

While Medina had every reason to feel motivated for a shot at upsetting DeGale, the defending champion couldn’t find similar inspiration.

“He was my mandatory challenger, so obviously I had to fight him,” DeGale said. “But it was hard to motivate myself to fight ‘Porky’ Medina. No disrespect, but he’s got six losses on his record. I’m not saying I wasn’t fit, because I was in good shape. It was just hard to get up for it.”

Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.