By Dan Ambrose: If former WBA/WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (45-1-1, 32 KOs) needs a catch-weight handicap in order to face IBF/IBO/WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin (34-0, 31 KOs), then it’s not going to happen, according to his trainer Abel Sanchez.
Sanchez says that Canelo will need to vacate the WBC middleweight title, if he defeats the current WBC 160lb champ Miguel Cotto, and then tries to force Golovkin to fight him at a catch-weight in his mandatory title defense of the belt. Golovkin is currently the #1 WBC middleweight mandatory challenger for the title, and he’s next up for a shot at the WBC belt.
However, Canelo recently said that if Golovkin wants a fight against him, he’ll need to agree to fight him at a catch-weight of 155lbs, because he doesn’t feel like he’s a full middleweight yet despite the fact that he’s out-weighed Golovkin recently in his fights.
Canelo says he could be ready to fight at middleweight in the next two years, but right now he doesn’t feel like he’s a real middleweight. Canelo recently rehydrated to 175lbs for one of his fights. Golovkin usually rehydrates to 170lbs for his fights at middleweight.
“If he [Golovkin] wants to fight with me, let him come down to 155 and I’ll fight him whatever day he wants,” Canelo said to Fighthype.com. “At this moment, my body isn’t ready for 160 pounds. Maybe 1 or 2 more years I’ll be ready for 160,” Canelo said.
Some boxing fans see this catch-weight request by Canelo as a ploy to try and weaken Gennady enough so that he’ll have a better chance of beating him. The 25-year-old Canelo is a lot younger than the 33-year-old Golovkin, which would make it likely a lot easier for Canelo to drain down to the 155lb catch-weight than the older Golovkin. Besides that, Canelo is used to draining down huge amounts of weight to fight at 154 and 155, so he’s got it down to a science by this point in time. Golovkin doesn’t do that. He fights in the weight class that is more suited to his body. Why the heavier Canelo doesn’t fight at the full weight of the middleweight division is unclear. It would seem logical for a fighter who rehydrates to as high as 175 to be fighting at 160 rather than a catch-weight of 155. That doesn’t make much sense at all.
As the WBC mandatory challenger to the WBC 160lb title, Golovkin doesn’t have to agree to Canelo’s request of him fighting at a catch-weight of 155lbs. That only works if Canelo were to be making a voluntary defense of the WBC title. I’m not sure that the 25-year-old Canelo is aware of that. He might be confused on the subject.
Canelo can only give Golovkin a take it or leave it offer of him fighting at 155 if Canelo were making a voluntary defense or if he was ready to vacate the WBC title if Golovkin didn’t give in to his request for the 155lb catch-weight. Of course, none of this will make any difference at all if Canelo doesn’t beat Cotto on November 21st in their fight on HBO PPV. If Canelo loses that fight, then he’s invisible and no longer matters.
The only one that will matter then would be Cotto, who would be forced to make the decision to either fight Golovkin at the full weight of 160lbs or vacate the title. Golovkin won’t likely give Cotto a catch-weight handicap either. That’s the beauty if Golovkin being the WBC mandatory challenger.
By being the WBC mandatory challenger, Golovkin doesn’t have to agree to agree to the catch-weight requests by Canelo or Cotto, if he decides to try and push that on him. The only thing Cotto will be able to do is suggest it to Golovkin, and tell him that he’ll vacate unless he gets his way. But I don’t think it matters to Golovkin. He just wants the title, and he won’t be railroaded into fighting at a weight-draining and strength-draining catch-weight.
It’ll make the Cotto-Canelo winner look bad if they try and get Golovkin to fight at a catch-weight for the fight. Cotto has already fought at catch-weights for his last two fights against Sergio Martinez and Daniel Geale. His next fight against Canelo will be at a catch-weight of 155. Canelo has fought his last three fights at catch-weights, and the Cotto fight will be his fourth in a row.
If the Cotto vs. Canelo winner opts to vacate the WBC title because Golovkin wouldn’t agree to give them a handicap weight advantage, it’s going to look bad in the eyes of a lot of boxing fans, because it’ll make it seem like the Cotto-Canelo winner if backing down from the Golovkin fight. When you’re the WBC 160lb champion, you’re supposed to be able to defend the belt at the full weight and not look to get catch-weight handicaps.
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