By Dan Ambrose: Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (47-1-1, 33 KOs) will be fighting WBO junior middleweight champion Liam Smith (23-0-1, 13 KOs) this Saturday night in a fight in the 154lb division. Canelo says the junior middleweight division is his natural weight where he feels the strongest, and that he will continue to fight in this weight class until he feels he’s grown out of it.
That’s potentially bad news for boxing fans that were hoping that the 26-year-old Canelo would move up in weight to fight IBF/IBO/WBA/WBC middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin next year. Canelo seems to be resistant to the idea of him moving up in weight.
We’ll see whether he continues to feel that way after his fight this Saturday night against the 28-year-old Smith on HBO pay-per-view at the AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas. Canelo recently said that he would be moving up to middleweight soon, but now it appears that he’s reversing course and will be staying at 154.
It’s unclear what made Canelo change his mind about moving up to 160. Perhaps he saw Golovkin’s fight against Kell Brook and decided he didn’t want to move up and have to deal with that? Golovkin says “I broke him” and he appears to be right. Brook ended up with a broken eye socket from one of Golovkin’s heavy punches in their fight last Saturday night at the O2 Arena in London, England.
“For the time being, I will continue to campaign at junior middleweight and am looking forward to once again regaining the championship at that weight class,” said Canelo. “Do I think I will eventually move up to middleweight and perhaps beyond? I do; when my body feels it’s time.”
There’s pluses and minuses for Canelo if he chooses to stay at junior middleweight for the next three to five years. If Canelo stays at this weight, then he doesn’t have to fight guys like Golovkin and Daniel Jacobs and risk being knocked out by them. Of course, Canelo will miss out on the tremendous paydays he would receive if he fought the top middleweights.
That’s a negative. But if you look at it from the stand point of Canelo potentially being finished as a pay-per-view attraction if he were to be brutally knocked out by Golovkin, it’s understandable why it would more appealing for him to stay at 154. Canelo can make a lot of smaller paydays on HBO pay per view by fighting guys like Liam Smith and Amir Khan without really risking anything. If Canelo stays at junior middleweight, the boxing fans are going to expect him to fight the top fighters like the Charlo brothers, Erislandy Lara [again], Demetrius Andrade and Julian Williams. Canelo could be strategic about it by going after Jermell Charlo, who some boxing fans see as the weaker of the Charlo brothers. If Canelo beats Jermell, he and Golden Boy Promotions could say that there’s no reason to fight the other Charlo brother Jermall, because they already beat one of them. It would be a poor excuse, but enough fans would likely buy into it not to give Canelo grief for failing to fight the arguably better half of the Charlo brothers in Jermall.
“For the last six years, my body has felt best and I have been strongest as a junior middleweight. I still feel that way today,” said Canelo. “Boxing history is full of fighters who have stayed at the same weight for the majority of their careers – and others who have moved up.”
It doesn’t seem like Canelo is too interested in moving up in weight, does it? He’s not just going to come out with and say, ‘I don’t want to fight Golovkin because he’s too big or too powerful.’ It like Canelo is going to just saying he’s not a middleweight, and that will be the reason why he’s not fighting Golvokin. It’s too bad. I think Canelo will eventually move up to middleweight at some pint. Boxing fans can at least be happy that Canelo will move up in weight in the future.
What could be seen as bad news is that by the time Canelo does move up in weight, Golovkin will be either too old to beat him or retired. You can argue that Golovkin’s last fight against Kell Brook is a sign that he’s starting to show his age. The 34-year-old Golovkin didn’t look well during the run up to the fight, and he didn’t look like the same youthful fighter that had blown through guys like Matthew Macklin and Gabriel Rosado in the past. If Canelo waits another three to five more years before moving up in weight to middleweight, Golovkin will likely be too old to beat him. The interest in a fight between an old Golovkin and a still young Canelo will likely have dropped off.