By Dan Ambrose: Trainer Ricky Funez expects WBC middleweight champion Miguel Cotto (40-4, 33 KOs) to use his vast amount of experience to give the 25-year-old Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (45-1-1, 32 KOs) all kinds of problems in their fight next month on November 28th on HBO PPV.
Funez notes that Cotto’s smaller brother Jose Miguel Cotto had Canelo hurt in the 1st round in their fight five years ago in 2010. Canelo was able to weather the storm in the 1st round to come back and score a 9th round knockout against the much lighter Cotto in that fight, but for a moment there it looked like Canelo was on the verge of being knocked out.
Funez likes the younger Canelo’s youth and power in this fight, but he’s not sure it will be enough for him to overcome the experience in the 35-year-old Cotto. The thing is Cotto’s capable of boxing at a high degree to keep from getting caught in a war the way that Canelo’s over-matched opponents James Kirkland and Alfredo Angulo were caught in.
Cotto can do a pretty good imitation of Floyd Mayweather Jr. when he’s focusing on his boxing skills and he’s long arms for a fighter only 5’7”. Cotto can fight on the outside to use his superior jab and he’s the much more mobile of the two fighters, even at 35. Cotto still has faster feet than Canelo.
“I believe he’s [Gennady Golovkin] is the real deal. Canelo is going to have a tough fight on his hands Cotto,” Funez said to Fighthype. “Cotto is no joke. He’ll stay there. Someone put a clip on Youtube of Cotto’s brother hurting Canelo. Just imagine what Cotto does. What Cotto has in this fight is experience, so we’ll see. Canelo has that power. He’s young, hungry, and he’s going for it,” Funez said.
It’s more than just experience for Cotto. He’s just the better athlete with the better overall skills than Canelo. Cotto has better punching power, hand speed and more snap on his shots than Canelo. Yes, Cotto is the smaller fighter by two inches and the lighter guy by 15 pounds, but he’s still the more athletic of the two.
When asked if the Coto-Canelo winner will face GGG next, Funez said “Well, that’s what the promoters are saying. We’ll see what Oscar De La Hoya…He’s saying it, that the winner will fight [Golokvin]. We’ll see. Hopefully that’s true.”
Funez can forget all about Canelo fighting Golovkin because he’s already said recently that he’s not going to let that fight happen until sometime in the future. It’s actually the smart thing to do because there will definitely be more money in a fight between Canelo and Golovkin in the next two years as long as the two fighters keep winning. But in the meantime, Canelo and Golovkin need to keep winning, and that means they might need to dip into the 154lb and 168lb divisions to find opponents.
Canelo might even dip into the 147lb division to face the winner of the Brandon Rios vs. Tim Bradley fight. There isn’t enough competition at 160 for Canelo and Golovkin to keep getting big fights.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuSTvDjB38o
Both of them need to fight the best fighters at 154 like Jermall Charlo, Demetrius Andrade and Erislandy Lara, and then face the best fighters at 168 like James DeGale, George Groves, Badou Jack, Gilberto Ramirez, Callum Smith, Rocky Fielding, Arthur Abraham, Andre Dirrell, Anthony Dirrell, Fedor Chudinov, and Vincent Feigenbutz.
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