By Dan Ambrose: Richard Schaefer, the CEO of Golden Boy Promotions, figures that his fighter WBC junior middleweight champion Saul Alvarez (41-0-1, 30 KO’s) is now ready to take on the big names – Miguel Cotto, Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Sergio Martinez – after Alvarez defeated welterweight Josesito Lopez by a 5th round TKO last Saturday night in Vegas.
Schaefer said to Fighthubtv.com “Tonight was the coming out party in a different way for Canelo Alvarez…Three names which jump out…Floyd Mayweather. Another one is Miguel Cotto, And another one is Sergio Martinez.”
This is kind of hard to believe that Schaefer feels that victories over handpicked fighters like Lopez, Lovemore N’dou, Matthew Hatton, Alfonso Gomez, Ryan Rhodes, Kermit Cintron, Shane Mosley and Carlos Baldomir suggest that Alvarez is ready for the likes of Mayweather Jr or Cotto. I can understand Sergio Martinez, but not Mayweather or Cotto.
Alvarez’s victories have prepared him more to finally defend his title against some live junior middleweight contenders for the first time like Erislandy Lara and Vanes Martirosyan than it has to fight Mayweather or Cotto. Lara and Martirosyan should be prerequisite opponents that Alvarez should fight and beat before he’s given a crack at Mayweather or Cotto. It just seems wrong to have a guy spoon fed older opponents for three years and then seeing Schaefer deem that he’s ready to fight Mayweather without having faced a quality junior middleweight from his own division. I do rate Josesito Lopez as a good light welterweight and a decent – but hardly great – welterweight, but he’s no junior middleweight and he shouldn’t have been in the ring with Alvarez last Saturday.
Golden Boy Promotions did a good job of protecting Alvarez by picking Lopez to fight instead of the much more dangerous Lara and Martirosyan. But there’s no way that Alvarez should get a fight with Cotto or Mayweather based on beating the guys that he’s been fighting recently. Alvarez needs to step it up and finally prove himself against someone good before he’s given a shot against Mayweather or Cotto.
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