(Photo credit: Esther Lin/Showtime) By Chris Williams: Showtime commentator Paulie Malignaggi believes that the 23-year-old Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (43-1-1, 31 KOs) will remain a popular and championship level fighter even if he gets clowned tonight by WBA junior middleweight champion Erislandy Lara (19-1-2, 12 KO’s) in Canelo’s requested catch-weight of 155 pounds, but as far as him being a marquee name, he’s going to take a hit in that area.
Malignaggi doesn’t see it possible for Canelo to continue to be a marquee fighter with him taking losses left and right each time he steps up against the very best. While Malignaggi gives Canelo a pat on the back for beating slow as molasses fighters like Alfredo Angulo, he notes that Angulo was perfect for Canelo due to his very, very slow style of fighting.
Angulo was the type of fighter that Canelo was brought up fighting in the early part of his career in Mexico. Lara and Floyd Mayweather Jr, on the other hand, are guys that Canelo had no experience in fighting. As we saw last September, Canelo looked clueless against Mayweather, and there’s a good chance he’ll look just as lost tonight against Lara.
“Canelo is a big name in boxing, but it’s difficult to keep that marquee name when you’re taking losses,”Malignaggi said to ESPN. It doesn’t mean he won’t be one of the best, but as far as marketability, your crossover potential is only as good as the losses your don’t take. There’s a lot to lose for Canelo.
It’s a very difficult fight, but if he wins it, I don’t know if he’ll win over the crossover fans, because Lara’s not that big of a name crossover-wise, but he’ll definitely win over the hardcore fans. He lost a lot of the hardcore fans the way he fought against Mayweather. If he can beat a guy like Erislandy Lara, it’ll give him a lot of the hardcore fans’ respect.”
Malignaggi is right about Canelo not being able to remain a marquee name if he loses the fight. He’ll still be a pay-per-view fighter, because Golden Boy Promotions will make sure they feed him soft touches for a while to build him back up before putting him in with Miguel Cotto, but he’ll definitely be seen in a different light by fans that have an actual clue about the sport.
Golden Boy would have to count on fans having only a scant knowledge about boxing for Canelo not to lose fans. We saw how Julio Cesar Chavez Jr lost a ton of fans from his loss to Sergio Martinez and his subsequent poor performance in his first fight against Brian Vera. Chavez Jr will be rebuilt and remade. Golden Boy will need to do the same with Canelo if Lara clowns him tonight in Mayweather fashion.
Canelo really needs to move up to middleweight already because it seems pretty obvious that he’s fighting out of the wrong division now. This is his second fight in a row where Canelo has asked for a catch-weight of 155. He says he can make the weight, but he looks unhealthy even in getting down to 155. The guy is clearly a middleweight now using the same approach that Chavez Jr used when he was melting down 20+ to fight smaller guys than him when he was fighting at middleweight. There must be some worry on Canelo’s part in fighting guys his own size in the middleweight division.
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