By Carlos F. Rivera: Moments ago, the 25-year-old Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (46-1-1, 32 KOs) defeated Miguel Cotto (40-5, 33 KOs) by a 12 round unanimous deicsion to win the vacant WBC middleweight title at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. I scored the fight 8 rounds to 4, 116 – 112, for Canelo. The official scores were 117-111, 119-109 and 118-110.
Canelo boxed and fought a smart fight. My only hope now is that he will start getting the respect he deserves. Many writers and analysts have tried writing him off as a manufactured champion. This win over the 35-year-old Cotto should put that to bed.
Canelo let Cotto fight his fight. He let him move and dance and left himself open for the jab the whole night. What he didn’t do was leave himself open for the patented Cotto left hook. Respecting Cotto’s power he would get inside and let off only one or two punches before stepping back out of range. But Canelo made sure that Cotto felt those one or two punches. The power punching output and landing percentage speak for themselves. A majority of the combinations Cotto put together were stopped in their tracks by a thudding right and left from Canelo.
Cotto tried his best, but against the bigger and stronger Canelo he didn’t have enough. Canelo was walking through the jab. The impact barely registering in his movements. The power shots being absorbed by the bigger man. On the opposite end, a clean left from Canelo made Cotto stop moving forward. He had no choice but to respect Canelo’s power. Freddie Roach repeatedly asked for Cotto to make Canelo move backwards, but his punches didn’t register the way they did against Delvin Rodriguez, Daniel Geale, or Sergio Martinez.
Canelo fought a smart fight. He would mix it up at times but remained aware of Cotto’s powerful left. He refused to get beat by that punch. He accepted the jabs and in return he would land powerful shots with both hands.
My only hope is that the same way Cotto had no choice but to respect Canelo’s power and skill the rest of the boxing community will respect the kid’s talent.
Carlos F. Rivera
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