By Dan Ambrose: ESPN boxing analyst Teddy Atlas says he’s hearing that Miguel Cotto (37-4, 30 KO’s) will be the one that ends up facing WBA/WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (42-0-1, 30 KO’s) rather than Floyd Mayweather Jr. (44-0, 26 KO’s) for Canelo’s next fight on September 14th in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Atlas said to ESPN: “My sources tell me it will be Miguel Cotto [who faces Canelo next]. Floyd Mayweather is not looking to fight. Yes, it would be a huge money fight [Mayweather vs. Canelo], but Mayweather can make money in a lot of different places. Why take a risk with a much bigger guy like Alvarez. So what I understand, Alvarez-Cotto is a much better bet than waiting to see Alvarez-Mayweather.”
Why should Mayweather fight a guy like Canelo that out-weighs him by 20 pounds when the guy isn’t as popular, hasn’t accomplished as much and isn’t as experienced. Canelo is more popular for being popular. He only has one real win on his resume against Austin Trout, and even that one was controversial because Trout out-landed him and out-worked him but found himself in a situation in Texas with semi-open scoring with two judges giving Canelo almost every round despite the fact that he was being out-landed and he was only working hard for one minute of every round. Mayweather shouldn’t waste his time with Canelo. If Canelo wants to fight with open scoring and in Texas, let him find someone else that is eager for that deal.
Golden Boy Promotions and Showtime are going to first try and make the Canelo-Mayweather fight first because that’s the fight they really want. Golden Boy wants it because Canelo is one of their fighters and it’ll bring big money to them, and Showtime wants it because it’s a bigger fight in terms of ratings and fan interest than a Canelo-Cotto fight at this point in Cotto’s career.
A fight between Cotto and Canelo would have been great before he suffered his first loss of his career to Antonio Margarito in 2008, but it’s not the same fight now with Cotto also having been beaten by Manny Pacquiao, Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Austin Trout. Cotto has lost his last two fights and he looked especially bad in the loss to Trout.
The Cotto-Canelo fight is about trying to get the most money and attention for the young Canelo, but the fight really shouldn’t be made until Cotto at least gets a couple of solid wins under his belt to make boxing fans forget about his last two defeats.
If they make Cotto-Canelo next then it won’t be nearly as big as it would if they waited until Cotto came back from those losses. They’re not going to wait though and Cotto probably doesn’t want to wait either because he only wants big fights at this point in his career, not the little ones that don’t make a lot of money. Canelo is Cotto’s best opportunity in the short term for a big payday unless Mayweather decides he wants to fight him again, and I don’t see that happening.
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