By Aonist Coles
Saul Canelo Alvarez was born in Tlajomulco de Zúñiga, Jalisco, Mexico on July 18th 1990. He turned pro after just 20 amateur fights at the age of 15. He stands about 5’9” with an arm reach of 70.5 inches. As a professional fighter, at just 23 years old, he has an outstanding record of 42-0 with 30 wins coming by way of knockout. However, once we began to dig a little deeper into his record, it seems more bloated than outstanding. Alvarez stormed onto the scene in 2010 and since then, he has become very popular in the sport of boxing.
The interesting thing about Canelo is when you examine his opponents, they all tend to be smaller fighters. Even when you look back at his days as a welterweight. His most notable win at welterweight was against Jose Cotto (brother of former 3x world champion Miguel Cotto). Jose Cotto spent the bulk of his career fighting at the lightweight division of 135 pounds.
Canelo’s last six opponents include Austin Trout, Joseito Lopez, Shane Mosley, Kermit Cintron, and Alfonzo Gomez. With the exception of the feather fisted Austin Trout, the majority of his previous opponents have all been either blown up 140 pounders, or blown up 147 pounders past their prime. Now the reason why this cannot be overlooked is because Canelo is viewed as a very big 154 pounder. He has a reputation for showing up the night of the fight weighing as much as a light heavyweight!
The questions that comes to my mind is: Why does Saul Alvarez (this oversized 154 pounder), want to beat up on smaller guys? Why has his competition been apparent mismatches? Does Golden Boy really believe that since Canelo was able to impose his size on overmatched, much smaller, feather-fisted fighters, he will be able to do the same against a fighter the caliber as Floyd Mayweather Jr?
Or is Golden Boy trying to cash out on the Canelo project? Win or lose, we can’t believe that he can keep making the 154 pound limit. So let’s assume Canelo was able to shock the world and beat Floyd Mayweather Jr. What would be next for Canelo? Middleweight, right. Can you imagine Canelo vs Gennady Gennadyevich Golovkin?
Not to underestimate Canelo, but he would get annihilated by GGG. He is not fast enough to out box GGG, and he doesn’t hit hard enough to earn his respect. You have to assume Golden Boy has already thought about this.
At the end of the day, Canelo does not have the pedigree to compete with Floyd. He is outgrowing the junior middleweight division, and he doesn’t have the necessary tools to compete at middleweight, where he won’t have a size advantage. On September 14th 2013, the Canelo project will come to an end by the hands of Floyd Mayweather Jr., and Golden Boy will finally cash out at the right time on their 3 year project with Canelo and reap the benefits of their investment.
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