By Dan Ambrose: Former WBA/WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez is hopeful that the Floyd Mayweather Jr vs. Manny Pacquiao fight will be an exciting on May 2nd. But Canelo believes that the person who holds the cards on determining whether the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight is an exciting one will rest in Mayweather’s hands.
Canelo thinks that if Mayweather wants to make it an exciting fight, he’ll put himself more at risk by trading more with Pacquiao. Canelo feels that Mayweather fought too defensively in their fight in 2013, and that’s why Canelo lost to him. He feels that if Mayweather had stood in front of him more, he would have had a chance to win.
“Floyd is very smart. He can makes things frustrating or he can make a spectacular fight. He does not expose anything,” Canelo said via Fox Deportes. “In the past, he’s thrown very few shots and makes things difficult. If he exposes himself just a little bit more, we can get an enjoyable fight.”
It doesn’t quite make sense for Mayweather to be exposing himself intentionally against a fighter known for being able to throw a ton of punches each round. Pacquiao can throw 100 shots per round if he wants to; whereas Mayweather is capable of throwing a little more than half of that many.
We’re talking different styles of fighting. So for Canelo to be suggesting that Mayweather should fight Pacquiao’s fight in order to make Canelo happy, it just seems like a stupid idea. It would be like asking the heavy-bodied Canelo to do something he has never shown the ability to do like fight hard for the full three minutes of every round without taking his normal rest breaks that he likes to take against the ropes.
I’d love to see Canelo put out effort for a full three minutes of every round for an entire 12 round fight, but I just don’t think he can do it without having to rest his huge 170+ pound frame. That’s why it doesn’t make any sense for Mayweather to slug with Pacquiao just because Canelo would find it enjoyable.
“Pacquiao comes forward and he’s always throwing a lot of punches, and he’s fast. He can complicate things with his movement as he did with Bradley and Marquez. Hopefully the fight is attractive,” Canelo said.
I think Pacquiao will be coming forward all night long against Mayweather in this fight, but I don’t suspect that Mayweather will be looking to exchange with him in a war. If we do see Mayweather exchange, he might score a knockout because he’s reportedly growing stronger with the help of his strength and conditioning coach Alex Ariza.
We really don’t know how good of a shot that Pacquiao can take at this point after his knockout loss to Juan Manuel Marquez in 2012. Since then Pacquiao’s promoter Bob Arum has matched him against two weak punchers in Chris Algieri and Tim Bradley, and a really slow fighter in Brandon Rios. Mayweather is a much different fighter than those guys, and a lot better than them.
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