By Dan Ambrose: Floyd Mayweather Jr. is gone from boxing with him retiring last year, and Saul “Canelo” Alvarez is seen by his promoter Oscar De La Hoya of Golden Boy Promotions as the replacement as the next star. The boxing world has been slow in agreeing that Canelo is Mayweather’s replacement, perhaps due to Canelo’s reluctance to step up to the plate and take on Gennady “GGG” Golovkin.
Taking that fight and proving that he can beat the Kazakhstan star would seem to be the barrier that Canelo must pass through for him to be the replacement for Mayweather. It’s not enough for Canelo’s promoter De La Hoya to tell the boxing world that he’s the guy that has taken the torch from Mayweather.
Canelo must actually prove it in the ring by fighting Golovkin, beating him, and showing the world that he’s stepped into Mayweather’s shoes to carry the sport. Beating Amir Khan and Liam Smith isn’t going to be enough for Canelo to be seen as the No.1 fighter in boxing. He needs to do a lot more than that by taking on Golovkin and showing that he can beat him.
“Well, the passing of the torch has already taken place,” said De La Hoya about his belief that the 26-year-old Canelo has replaced Mayweather. ”With Mayweather being retired and Pacquiao being retired, Canelo is the face of boxing now. He’s proven it with ticket sales. He’s proven it with Pay-Per-Views, and he’s going to prove it once again by outselling Manny Pacquiao at the AT&T arena. So I believe this is just the beginning for Canelo, and he has a long future ahead for himself. We can’t wait to be part of it,” said De La Hoya.
I don’t agree with De La Hoya about Canelo having replaced Mayweather as the biggest star in the sport. I think Canelo is a popular fighter with his segment of boxing fans that he has there to support in the United States, but I don’t think he’s the guy that has taken the torch from Mayweather. Canelo needs to show that he’s for real and not just a manufactured star whose career brand has been built off of wins over guys that weighed less than him. Canelo needs to fight the better fighters like Golovkin, Daniel Jacobs, Chris Eubank Jr, the Charlos Brothers, Demetrius Andrade, Julian Williams and a rematch with Erislandy Lara. It’s possible that Canelo can beat all those guys, but until he faces them to show that he’s better, it’s no good.
I think the sport is going to go through a weak period with Canelo being the top guy if he chooses to avoid the Golovkin fight. Canelo will be seen by a lot of boxing fans as someone that is not the real thing if he doesn’t get inside the ring with Golovkin or the other top fighters. If Golden Boy is just going to match Canelo against guys like Liam Smith, Alfredo Angulo, James Kirkland, Amir Khan and Billy Joe Saunders, then I don’t see him being able to take the baton from Mayweather in a real way.
The way I see it, Mayweather left the baton on the ground and Canelo is kicking it around the track rather than picking it up and running with it. Canelo isn’t doing it the right way by picking up the baton and setting an example of what the next star of the sport is all about by facing the best and daring to be great. We’re not seeing that from Canelo. We’re seeing him being matched against smaller fighters in safe fights where he has a clear advantage over his lighter opponents.
“People love Canelo and they want to see Canelo because he brings excitement to the sport,” said De La Hoya. “He brings exciting fights. And this fight here with Liam Smith is going to be a toe-to-toe, “right in the center of the ring” type of action fight. That’s why people love Canelo. He works hard, he’s a serious fighter, and he brings a lot of action to the table.”
I think there’s a segment of casual boxing fans that love Canelo, but I believe there is a bigger segment of hardcore boxing fans that are still on the fence about him. Canelo can win over those fans if he takes on Golovkin and proves that he can beat him. Even if Canelo loses to Golovkin, he can still win over those fans if he at least tries to beat him. But Canelo can’t afford to wait too much longer before he faces GGG, because if he chooses to wait him out until he’s an old man before he fights him, then many fans will see this as a weak and cowardly way of going about fighting him. The brave way is for Canelo to fight him right now at the full weight of 160lbs for the middleweight division. The weak way is to wait five years until Golovkin is pushing 40 before fighting hm.