By Dan Ambrose: WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez is reportedly interested in facing Miguel Cotto for his next fight on May 4th despite the fact that Cotto was beaten in his last fight by WBA junior middleweight champion Austin Trout last month.
It was thought that Canelo wasn’t interested in facing Cotto due to the huge negative reaction from hardcore boxing fans at the thought of Canelo facing the loser of the Cotto-Trout fight instead of the winner, but it looks like Canelo has changed his mind and is suddenly seeing Cotto as a viable option.
If Canelo chooses Cotto, it will likely please Richard Schaefer of Golden Boy Promotions because he said that a loss for Cotto against Trout shouldn’t mean that a Cotto-Canelo fight couldn’t still take place on May 4th.
I guess if you’re looking at this from the casual boxing fan’s perspective, it might not matter if Canelo faces Cotto instead of Trout because the casual fans will either not know about Cotto having lost his last two fights to Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Trout or they just won’t care whether he lost or not. They just want to see Cotto and Alvarez fight regardless of how well things are going for Cotto in his career.
Trout said last Friday that he still hadn’t been contacted about a fight with Canelo, saying “I have no idea. I hope to hit that target [Canelo], but he’s going to move. I don’t think Canelo is ducking me. I think papa [Oscar] De La Hoya and [Richard] Schaefer are ducking me. We’ll see if they let him come out in the yard and play. My promoters believe in me, and would throw me in against anybody in the 154 pound division.”
Trout is correct. If the Canelo-Trout fight isn’t made, it’s likely that Golden Boy didn’t like the idea of putting their “Golden Goose” with Trout and risking having him beaten before he starts laying the golden eggs for them in terms of becoming a pay per view star along the lines of Floyd Mayweather Jr. It may take careful match-making by Golden Boy to turn Canelo into that kind of a star by keeping him away from guys that can potentially beat him like Trout, Erislandy Lara and Vanes Martirosyan.
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