By Dan Ambrose: 20-year-old WBC Silver light middleweight champion Saul Alvarez (34-0-1, 26 KO’s) defends his World Boxing Council title this Saturday night against 39-year-old welterweight Lovemore N’dou (48-11-2, 31 KO’s) on HBO Latino at the Estadio Beto Avila, Veracruz, Veracruz, Mexico. For Alvarez, this is his second consecutive fight against a 39-year-old fighter. Some of Alvarez’s fans see him being matched up against 39-year-old fighters back to back and small lightweights like Jose Miguel Cotto as brilliant match-making. I’m not one of those people.
I see it as cherry picking fights for a guy that may not have to skills to ever be more than a Silver belt holder or a possible paper title holder. But his fight on HBO at this early point in his career shows you that HBO is thinking he’s going to be a star in the future. Like many of the fighters that they’ve wasted time showing over and over again in the past, Alvarez may not ever get beyond holding obscure titles like the Silver belt. He is young enough so that he can wait out guys that he probably will never able to beat like Sergio Martinez, Sergeii Dzinziruk and Floyd Mayweather Jr.
N’dou obviously is being brought in to make Alvarez look good, and give him a name for his resume, which is filled with 2nd tier opposition. Having N’dou’s name on his resume will give the appearance that Alvarez has beaten someone good, when in reality he’s taking on a guy that’s pushing 40 and probably not far from retirement. This could work for Alvarez and HBO if he’s able to look good in taking N’dou out without struggling. However, if N’dou stays on his feet, fights back or shudder the thought, beats Alvarez, it’s going to make HBO and Alvarez look bad.
Normally, you would hope that HBO would take a wait and see approach to a fighter like Alvarez until he’s at least beaten someone with a pulse instead of the 2nd tier fodder and old champions like Carlos Baldomir and N’dou that are being fed to Alvarez. It’s not a good sign that Alvarez was staggered by the smallish Cotto last May and was tagged over and over in that fight. If Alvarez looks bad against N’dou, his handlers may have to dig up a never-ending supply of 39-year-olds for Alvarez to keep beating so that he doesn’t get knocked out. I see Alvarez as being another Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. hype job, and not someone that actually has talent.
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