By Dan Ambrose: Mexican great Juan Manuel Marquez is picking former WBA/WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (44-1-1, 31 KOs) to beat James Kirkland (32-1, 28 KOs) in their fight on May 2nd at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas.
Marquez doesn’t give his reasons for believing that the 24-year-old Canelo will beat Kirkland, but it probably has a lot to do with Canelo being the more active fighter, and Kirkland having to lose more than 40+ pounds to make the 155 pound catch-weight on May 2nd.
Kirkland is reportedly close to 200 pounds, according to Dan Rafael. That puts Kirkland in a situation where he’ll need to lose more than 15 pounds per month to make weight.
Kirkland will probably not even bother taking off all the weight, but that’s still not a good thing because it means he’ll likely be flabby like he was when he was knocked out in the 1st round by Nubohiro Ishida in their fight in 2012.
“I think Canelo is a good fighter, he’s a good Mexican fighter. Kirkland he’s a stronger guy, he’s a good fighter too but I think Canelo wins the fight,” Marquez said via Thaboxingvoice.com.
Canelo will probably choose to box Kirkland rather than stay in the pocket with him and risk getting chopped down like many of Kirkland’s opponents have been. If Canelo stands in the pocket and tries to slug with Kirkland then it’s going to go badly for Canelo. That also depends on how weight drained and out of shape Kirkland is after dropping a lot of weight.
Canelo’s promoters at Golden Boy Promotions picked carefully in matching him against the rusty Kirkland rather than putting him in with someone that’s in better shape, fighting on a regular basis, and with better defensive skills.
They could have matched Canelo with Gennady Golokvin, David Lemeiux, Demetrius Andrade, Vanes Martirosyan, Erislandy Lara or the Charlo brothers. Those guys are at least relevant and still fighting on a regular basis. Kirkland hasn’t fought in a year since his win over Glen Tapia.
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