Margarito unlikely to get Canelo fight

By Boxing News - 08/16/2016 - Comments

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By Allan Fox: Antonio Margarito called out Saul Canelo Alvarez and Miguel Cotto last Saturday night after beating Canelo’s brother Ramon Alvarez by a 10 round split decision in Rosarito, Mexico. It was Margarito’s second win since coming back from a long 4 ½ year retirement from boxing.

Margarito, 38, is looking to come back to get a big money fight against Cotto or Canelo. It’s not probable that Cotto is going to give Margarito a third fight, because he closed the chapter on the Mexican fighter in 2011, when he beat him by a 10th round stoppage to avenge his loss from several years earlier than that.

Canelo has so many different options available to him. He and his promoters at Golden Boy probably won’t make that fight because it would lead to a huge backlash from many boxing fans. They would rightfully ask the question of why Canelo is fighting Margarito but not Gennady “GGG” Golovkin.

“I want big fights, [a third fight with Miguel] Cotto, Canelo, and not a rematch with Ramon,” said Margarito via espn.com. “I am ready for big fights. Now I want to beat his brother Saul.”

Margarito should probably think about giving Ramon Alvarez a rematch because there fight was close enough to warrant a second fight. Margarito won the fight by the scores 97-92, 97-92 for Margarito, and 95-94 for Alvarez. The fight looked to be even five rounds apiece. The thing that separated them was Margarito’s 8th round knockdown of the 30-year-old Alvarez. Other than that knockdown, the fight looked to be an even affair.

Alvarez has already asked for a rematch because he feels he beat Margarito. Margarito might not get a fight against Canelo, but he’s got a good chance of getting a second fight against Alvarez if he wants it. That could be the biggest fight that Margarito can get unless his promoters are able to setup a fight between him and someone else. It’s not likely that any big names would want to fight Margarito. He doesn’t look like he’s got the skills anymore to beat anyone other than a limited fighter like Ramon Alvarez. Margarito has lost too much from his game to be any kind of threat to beating Canelo. This would be even more one-sided than Canelo’s recent stoppage win over Amir Khan last May. Canelo can’t get a reputation of fighting weak opposition because he won’t be taken seriously by the boxing public. If Canelo is going to fight a bunch of older fighters from the past like Margarito, Alfredo Angulo and James Kirkland, then the fans are going to catch on at some point and see him as a fake, especially with him not fighting Gennady Golovkin.

Canelo cannot fight Margarito now because he has a fight scheduled against Liam Smith next month on September 17 at the AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas. Golden Boy Promotions already has WBO middleweight champion Billy Joe Saunders pegged as Canelo’s next fight after that in December on HBO PPV. Margarito doesn’t fit into the 26-year-old Canelo’s plans right now for 2016. If Golden Boy wants to feed Margarito to Canelo, then they’ll need to wait until next year to set up that mismatch.