Mayweather wanted 147 or 150 for Canelo; Schaefer negotiated 152

By Boxing News - 06/03/2013 - Comments

floyd#1By Dan Ambrose: Chepo Reynoso, the trainer for WBA/WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (42-0-1, 30 KO’s), says that Floyd Mayweather Jr. (44-0, 26 KO’s) initially asked for Canelo to fight him at 147 for their September 14th fight in Las Vegas, Nevada.

When he was unable to get Canelo to fight at that weight, he targeted a catch-weight of 150. It was Golden Boy Promotions CEO Richard Schaefer who successfully negotiated the catch-weight of 152 lbs, which just happened to be the original request from Canelo’s team.

They asked for a small two pound catch-weight right off the bat and it was Mayweather who gave ground twice in the negotiations to finally agree to what Team Canelo was asking for.

Canelo’s trainer Reynoso said to ESPN Deports “Mayweather wanted to fight at 147, then 150, and…fortunately Richard Schaefer is a great negotiator and people know that Mayweather is a very attractive fight.”

As you can see, Mayweather was the one that gave ground in a big way to the younger 22-year-old Mexican star. Instead of the fight taking place at 147, which is where arguably should have taken place, Mayweather ended up agreeing to what Canelo’s team’s original request was.

In other words, Mayweather didn’t get Team Canelo to budge at all to meet him halfway. The hallway point from 147 and 154 is 150.5 lbs, and that’s something that Mayweather should have insisted on instead of giving into what Canelo’s team wanted. Mayweather didn’t even ask for a rehydration limit to keep Canelo from rehydrating up to 170 like he did in his last fight in April.

Whether Mayweather will be sorry for not negotiating in a more assertive manner with Canelo remains to be seen, but I think he made a crucial mistake in not sticking to 150.5 as the weight for the fight along with a rehydration clause of 160 to keep Canelo from coming in at 172.

If Mayweather ends up getting crushed by the much heavier Canelo on September 14th then you’ve got to figure that it was the weight that did Mayweather in. That’s the problem with having someone who arguably should be fighting at middleweight fighting welterweights like Mayweather. It’s hard to give that fighter full credit if he wins because gave up much in the negotiations.



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