By Dan Ambrose: Golden Boy Promotions president Oscar De La Hoya expects that the May 9th fight between his flagship fighter 24-year-old Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (44-1-1, 31 KOs) and James Kirkland (32-1, 28 KOs) to sell a huge amount of tickets in their fight at the Minute Maid Park, in Houston, Texas, USA.
The price of the tickets certainly will help make that a reality, as the lowest cost of the tickets are $10. It goes up from there with the tickets being sold for $350, $150, $100, $50, and $25. In contrast, the minimum price for the Floyd Mayweather Jr vs. Manny Pacquiao fight are going for $1000, and it goes up dramatically from there.
The Canelo-Kirkland tickets will go on sale next week on March 3rd at 10:00 a.m. De La Hoya previously said that he feels that the Canelo-Kirkland fight will sell 60,000 tickets. That obviously won’t be possible given the size dimensions of the Minute Maid Stadium, which seats a little over 40,000.
With the tickets being low cost, it’s possible that the Canelo-Kirkland fight might sell out the Minute Maid stadium, although I have a feeling that they’ll be lucky if they even sellout half of the stadium. A lot of things have changed since Canelo’s fight against previously undefeated Austin Trout in 2013.
Over 40,000 tickets were sold for that fight, which took place at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas. Both Trout and Canelo were undefeated at the time and both of them held down world titles. It was a fight matching two guys that were considered to be two of the best fighters at 154. The fight was marred with the lopsided scores in favor of Canelo, who fought well enough to deserve a draw at best.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ARxNGg0-J5o
A lot of boxing fans felt that Canelo lost that fight. But what was really sad was the lopsided scores that Canelo was given by the judges. Canelo was outworked in every round of the fight, and he spent the last six rounds with his back against the ropes fighting defensive after he was hit by a hard body shot by Trout in the midpoint of the fight.
Canelo was later beaten by Floyd Mayweather Jr by a 12 round majority decision in September. Interesting enough, one judge scored the fight a draw rather than seeing Mayweather as the winner.
Last July, Canelo won another controversial decision, this time against Erislandy Lara. No matter whether you saw Canelo as the winner or not, you can’t deny that he looked terrible in the fight. He looked as bad against Lara as he did in the Mayweather fight, and it’s not surprising that Canelo and his promoter De La Hoya chose not to give Lara a rematch to clear up the controversy.
With the way that Canelo was exposed by Trout, Mayweather and Lara, I think it’s asking a lot of boxing fans for them to purchase 43,000 tickets in order to sellout the Minute Maid Stadium.
Canelo said “I’m very happy that my upcoming fight with James Kirkland will air on HBO; it will be exciting, explosive and should not be missed. Kirkland is a dangerous fighter who is coming prepared for a tough night and this fight, without a doubt, will be one to remember. I promise my fans I will be victorious and invite everyone to come out and join us at Minute Maid Park on May 9. They will not be disappointed.”
What makes the Canelo-Kirkland fight even less likely to sell a lot of tickets is the fact that Kirkland hasn’t been an active fighter and he’s reportedly badly out of shape. De La Hoya/Golden Boy picked a fighter who hadn’t fought since 2013, and who has had only a handful of fights since 2011. Kirkland has fought only twice since 2011. He fought once in 2012 and once in 2013. In another words, Kirkland has fought only two times in the last three years. Just why De La Hoya picked out a rusty and out of shape fighter like Kirkland for Canelo is the big question. Canelo could have been matched against the Charlo brothers, Lara, or Demetrius Andrade, but instead he’s been put in with an inactive and overweight Kirkland, who is rumored to be close to 200 pounds.
Canelo was recently matched against a rusty and out of shape Alfredo Angulo in a pay-per-view bout in 2014. Angulo reportedly had to lose over 40 pounds in a short period of time to make weight for the catch-weight fight at 155 pounds. The result was that Angulo looked weak and it was easily the worst performance of his career.
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