Kirkland will attack Canelo’s body, says adviser Miller

By Boxing News - 01/30/2015 - Comments

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By Dan Ambrose: James Kirkland (32-1, 28 KOs) plans on going after the body of former WBA/WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (44-1-1, 31 KOs) in order to chop down the 24-year-old Mexican star in their fight at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas.

The original date for the Canelo-Kirkland fight is/was scheduled for the Cinco de Mayo Mexican holiday on May 2nd, but that’s now subject to change given the news that boxing stars Floyd Mayweather Jr and Manny Pacquiao could be facing each other in a mega-fight on May 2nd on HBO and Showtime from the MGM Grand in in Las Vegas, Nevada.

There’s no way that a fight between Canelo and Kirkland can go ahead on the same night given the magnitude of that fight. Additionally, HBO would be televising the Mayweather-Pacquiao fight on pay-per-view. So unless Canelo wants to have his fight with Kirkland be part of a slit site telecast with the Mayweather vs. Pacquiao fight, he’s going to need to swallow his pride and give up on fighting on Cinco de Mayo.

Kirkland’s adviser Michael Miller say Kirkland will be going to Canelo’s body in this fight, and he’ll be making sure that he’s busier than the 24-year-old as well. Miller and Kirkland perhaps saw how Austin Trout hurt Canelo with a body shot in their fight in April 2013, and that resulted in the red-haired Canelo retreating to the ropes after the 7th round and spending the final five rounds in that spot. Canelo just wouldn’t get off the ropes after taking a hard body shot from Trout in the 7th round, and you have to figure that he didn’t want to get hit again in that area.

Canleo’s opposition rarely attack him to the body, and that’s perhaps why Trout was able to expose that weak spot in his game.

“He’s [Kirkland] going to be busier than him [Canelo], go to the body,” Miller said via Thesweetscience.com. “Canelo doesn’t like that and James hits as hard as or harder than anyone Canelo has been in the ring with. James also thinks he takes parts of rounds or rounds off.”

There’s no question that Canelo takes rounds off when he’s got a guy that stands his ground or comes sat him. Canelo gets tired and will retreat to the ropes where he rests. He tried doing that against Floyd Mayweather Jr in their fight in 2013, and Mayweather gave Canelo a lot of punishment. The fight was so one-sided that Mayweather basically coasted from the 9th round on. But incredibly one judge scored the fight a draw despite Mayweather’s total domination.

For some reason, Canelo is very lucky when it comes to the scoring of his fights, because he appeared to fight to lose to Erislandy Lara last July in their fight at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, yet Canelo was given a 12 round split decision win with the scores of 115-113 and 117-111 for Canelo, and 115-113 for Lara. Likewise, Canelo was given a wide 12 round decision win over Trout in a fight that many fans saw as either a win for Trout or a 12 round draw.



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