By Dan Ambrose: Junior middleweight Ramon Alvarez (20-4-2, 12 KOs), one of Saul “Canelo” Alvarez’s older brothers, easily defeated #5 WBO Omar Chavez (32-3-1, 22 KOs) by a 10 round unanimous decision last Saturday night at the Palenque de la Feria, Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas, Mexico. Omar Chavez is the son of boxing great Julio Cesar Chavez.
The final judges’ scores were 96-94, 96-94 and 98-92. The 98-92 score was by far the most accurate score of the three judges because it was a really one-sided fight from start to finish with the 28-year-old Alvarez dominating the lanky and skinny Chavez.
While listed at 5’8”, Ramon Alvarez looked to be no more than 5’6” in height and considerably shorter than the 5’8” Chavez. Both guys are listed at 5’8”, but there was no way that Alvarez was even within 2 inches of Chavez. Alvarez might be even shorter than 5’6”. He’s really lacking in the height department in a huge way.
Omar fought well in the 1st round when he was able to hit Alvarez with some wide hooks that he was throwing all night long. However, Omar went downhill dramatically after the 1st round as Alvarez was able to walk him down and get within punching range to land his short punches.
Chavez’s arms were much longer than Alvarez’s, but he wasn’t able to jab for some reason. Even when Chavez tried to jab, there was no power on them. His arms were too thin and without muscle for him to generate any kind of pop with those punches. It’s perhaps for that reason that Chavez rarely even tried to hit Alvarez with jabs. For the most part, Chavez moved constantly and stayed with his back against the ropes. The movement slowed Alvarez down a little bit, but he was still able to get to Chavez frequently due to Chavez stopping with his back against the ropes and letting Alvarez come at him.
Alvarez started getting cocky by the 4th round, as he showboated and appeared to be trying to imitate Roy Jones Jr with his fighting style. Alvarez was winning the fight, but he looked far from impressive. You could see a lot of his brother Canelo’s fighting style with the way Alvarez fought, but without the speed, power and size that Canelo has.
Chavez rarely threw punches in the fight until the 8th round. At that point he seemed to realize what his predicament was and he finally started letting his hands go. When Chavez was coming forward, he wasn’t a half bad fighter, because he was able to nail Alvarez with a lot of shots in rounds 8 through 10. But the problem was Chavez kept backing up against the ropes each time Alvarez would come at him, and he wouldn’t stand his ground the way he needed to.
I don’t see either Alvarez or Chavez going anywhere at 154. Both guys are lacking in power, speed and talent. Alvarez is just way too short to be fighting at 154, and he needs to drop down to 140 if he wants to try and make something happen.
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