“I don’t need their belt”. “This fight sells itself”. GGG fights at the true middleweight limit of 160-pounds, while Alvarez chooses to fight at the catchweight of around 154. Watch the big fight on HBO coverage.
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Tonight the center of the boxing world is in Las Vegas for Miguel Cotto vs. Canelo Alvarez. One of the featured prelim bouts was not without controversy as defending IBF bantamweight champion Randy Caballero had to vacate his title on the scale as he missed weight badly. “That is how important this event is to us”.
“We can confirm that the victor must face our interim champion, Golovkin”, the World Boxing Council confirmed yet again last week.
Canelo and Oscar are two different fighters and it is unfair to compare Canelo to Oscar right now considering all the incredible things Oscar has accomplished in his boxing career, but that will always happen in individual sports, especially with two men of Mexican descent.
Mayweather handled Alvarez easily when they fought in September 2013 though it was judged a majority decision for Mayweather. “I am a fighter; I am here not for business”. It can be remembered that he lost his middleweight crown this week when he refused a $300,000 sanctioning fee to the WBC this week.
The win for Canelo makes him the new lineal middleweight champion in addition to the WBC middleweight.
Not that Cotto is terribly concerned with the gaudy green belt. Could we see something of an agreed-upon “victory lap” title defense for Canelo on the May 7 date before a fight with Golovkin? Cotto said he just wants to win, and didn’t promise a war.
Cotto is a big attraction himself, though it appeared his career was over after back-to-back losses to Mayweather and Austin Trout in 2012.
The two clicked, and Cotto has stopped all three of his opponents under Roach.
“Obviously, it’s a fight with a lot of responsibility and I’m up for it. I’m looking forward to it because I know it can go down in history as one of the great fights between Mexico and Puerto Rico”, Alvarez said.
“I don’t think he’s done”. Alvarez (46-1-1, 31 KOs) wants to be boxing’s next pay-per-view king in the post-Floyd Mayweather era, and taking on the fearsome Golovkin would go a long way toward proving that. “That I’m at this level shows the quality of my trainer”. But there’s no question Alvarez was the rightful victor and he seemed ready to move on.
Cotto tried to change the momentum in round six. But at age 35, he wants to box more against an opponent who is a decade younger.
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“I was crossing my fingers every single minute of every round”.
