Floyd Mayweather and Bob Arum may not be sending each other Christmas cards this year, but that doesn’t mean the Top Rank boss is betting against his former fighter when he takes on Saul Alvarez.
On September 14, at the MGM in Las Vegas, Floyd Mayweather takes on Alvarez in one of his most anticipated fights in years. In a battle of the unbeaten, one will taste defeat for the very first time.
According to Bob Arum, that fighter should be Saul Alvarez. He believes that not only will there be too big of an experience advantage for Mayweather, but his superior conditioning should come into play as well.
“The problem with Canelo, as with a lot of young fighters, is they don’t have the stamina, they run out of gas,” Arum told esnewsreporting.com.
“That’s what happened to him in the Austin Trout fight. Austin Trout didn’t know how to capitalize, Mayweather would.”
Back in April, Alvarez defeated Trout by unanimous decision in San Antonio. Despite some peculiar scores from the judges, the fight was incredibly tight. Had the fight not been held under open scoring rules, many would have not known who was ahead going into the closing rounds.
The win was the 43rd straight to begin his career. However, none of his vanquished foes have been nearly of the quality of Floyd Mayweather. For Mayweather, he is 44-0, with his last victory coming over Robert Guerrero in May.
“If they had fought a year maybe two years from now, maybe it would be different,” Arum said. “But Canelo just doesn’t have the speed or the stamina to cope with Mayweather. Mayweather’s a really good fighter.”
“Right now, off Mayweather’s last fight, Canelo doesn’t stand much of a chance. I think Mayweather wins a decision or stops him late.”
Perhaps it is a testament to the ability of Mayweather, that despite this being proclaimed as his toughest challenge in quite some time, that he is still the pick of almost everyone offering up one. One advantage Alvarez should have come fight night is size. He is likely to outweigh the smaller Mayweather by a minimum of ten pounds, and likely significantly more.
If he can take advantage of his smaller opponent, perhaps he has a chance. But if Floyd is able to capitalize on experience, speed and stamina, it is likely to go down pretty much just as Bob Arum said.
