Weights: Canelo 154.5, Kirkland 154.5, Gomez vs. Soto fight called off

By Boxing News - 05/08/2015 - Comments

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By Dan Ambrose: In a clear sign that it might be time for light welterweight contender Frankie Gomez to start thinking about moving up to welterweight, he failed to make weight today for his now cancelled fight against former two division world champion Humberto Soto on Saturday at the Minute Maid Park in Houston, Texas.

Both fighters came in over the 141 pound limit for their fight. Gomez weighed in at 147.5, whereas Soto came in at 142.5. Even after they raised the limit to 145, Gomez wasn’t going to be able to take off the extra 2.5 pounds.

The guy is a really big light welterweight and he needs to move up in weight to 147. Gomez won’t have the advantages at welterweight that he enjoyed at light welterweight, but at least Golden Boy Promotions will be able to count on him to make weight.

According to Dan Rafael of ESPN, Golden Boy matchmaker Eric Gomez said “It’s too risky” to go through with the Gomez vs. Soto fight. It was too much weight that Gomez would have had to take off, and if he didn’t, it would have put Soto in the position where he’d be fighting a junior middleweight.

With the Gomez-Soto fight now off, the only fights that HBO will be showing is the main event between former WBA/WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (44-1-1, 31 KOs) and James Kirkland (32-1, 28 KOs) and the Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Manny Pacquiao replay.

Canelo weighed in at 154.5 for his catch-weight fight at 155 pounds against Kirkland. For his part, Kirkland weighed 154.5.

The card isn’t going to be the same with the Gomez-Soto fight because that really was the main interesting fight for the card. The Canelo-Kirkland fight could turn out to be a mismatch due to Kirkland having been out of action for two years, and having had to take off almost 50 pounds of fat just to make weight. The before and after photos are pretty dramatic in the way Kirkland looked before he took off all the fat. I can’t imagine him feeling too strong with all the weight he took off during training camp.

Other weights on the card are as follows:

Jo Jo Diaz 125.5 – Giovanni Delgado 125.5
Taishan Dong 289 – Jamal Woods 248.5
Joshua Clottey 153.8 – Jorge Silva 154.8



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