By Dan Ambrose: Golden Boy Promotions CEO Richard Schaefer pretty much ruled out the chance of his fighter WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (41-0-1, 30 KO’s) fighting WBA junior middleweight champion Austin Trout (26-0, 14 KO’s) when Schaefer told Sports Illustrated writer Chris Mannix “At this point I don’t think it [Alvarez-Trout] will happen.”
Schaefer didn’t say why it wouldn’t happen, just that it wouldn’t likely happen. If the fight doesn’t happen it won’t be because of lack of interest on Trout’s part because he badly wants to fight Canelo because he sees weakness there and he believes he can school the young 22-year-old Mexican fighter.
Now that Schaefer has kind of revealed his cards a little by ruling out Trout for the Alvarez fight, you have to consider what other options there are for Alvarez. He’s going to be fighting on the pay per view undercard of the Floyd Mayweather jr. fight on May 4th and he’s going to need someone that the boxing public don’t laugh at when the fight is announced.
You can’t have a good main event fight followed by a terrible co-main event with Alvarez facing another like light welterweight like he did in his last fight against Josesito Lopez. Since the fight is going to be taking place on Cinco de Mayo holiday on May 4th, it’s going to likely be either a Mexican that Alvarez faces or probably a Puerto Rican so that Golden Boy can get the whole Mexico vs. Puerto Rico rivalry going.
The only Puerto Rican fighter that Golden Boy can put in with Alvarez is Miguel Cotto, but that’s probably not going to happen because of Cotto’s recent string of losses. I think he’s probably the #1 guy that Golden Boy will be looking to put in with Alvarez, but I think the money might be an issue and I see Cotto choosing not to take the fight. It would put Alvarez in a potentially embarrassing situation of fighting the loser of the Trout-Cotto fight instead of the winner and it would likely further increase the belief among some fans that Alvarez is just a soon-fed cherry picker fighter instead of one that takes on the best.
I see Alvarez’s next opponent coming from the welterweight division. That’s how Golden Boy has been matching him for a while now for the most part and I don’t they’ll break from that habit in order to make sure Alvarez doesn’t get beaten.
It’s likely going to be one of these welterweights that Alvarez faces:
Marcos Maidana
Luis Carlos Abregu
Carson Jones
Jan Zaveck
Randall Bailey
Vyacheslav Senchenko
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