Cotto will beat Canelo, says Lee

By Boxing News - 11/20/2015 - Comments

1-cotto-vs-alvarez (9)By Scott Gilfoid: WBO 160lb belt holder Andy Lee is picking former WBC middleweight champion Miguel Cotto (40-4, 33 KOs) to top Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (45-1-1, 32 KOs) this Saturday night in their HBO televised fight on pay-per-view. Lee likes Cotto’s intelligence in the fight, as well as his experience as being factors that will lead to victory over the much younger and heavier 25-year-old Canelo.

Lee doesn’t have any reasons for wanting Cotto to win the fight, because he’s interested in fighting a unification match against IBF/IBO/WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin in 2016 if Lee can successfully get past #1 WBO challenger Billy Joe Saunders in their fight on December 19th at the Manchester Arena in Manchester, UK.

“I’m going against the grain and picking Cotto,” Lee said via frankwarren.com. “He’s boxing very cleverly at the moment and I see him using all his experience to box around Canelo.”

Canelo and Cotto are evenly matched in this fight at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. It’s one of those fights that are impossible to pick from. Lee is just guessing obviously in picking Cotto as the winner. He can’t know who’s going to win the fight.

It’s perhaps more wishful thinking on Lee’s part than anything in selecting the aging 35-year-old Cotto as the winner of Saturday’s fight against the young buck Canelo. It might be better for Lee if Cotto wins the fight because he stands a better chance of fighting Cotto than Canelo in my view, because Cotto would likely side step around Golovkin to face Lee in his next fight unless someone like Floyd Mayweather Jr. emerges from retirement to look his way.

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“At his best, Miguel has excellent rhythm and I believe he can use that to frustrate Alvarez, who I expect will come looking to take him out with one spectacular punch. Cotto on points,” Lee said.

Cotto is a good fighter, to be sure. I just don’t know that he’s going to be able to overcome Canelo’s youth and size advantage in this fight.

“I believe that Alvarez will be too fresh for Cotto,” Saunders said. “He has got too much on his side, like youth, strength and speed, and I think Cotto may be just on the slide now. I think Alvarez will win by late stoppage, but it’s going to be a cracking fight.”

I agree with Saunders. Canelo is too young for Cotto, and will probably win the fight. I just hope that the fight doesn’t go to the scorecards because it would be a real buzz-kill if the judges pick out the winner of this fight, because I can see controversy written all over this one.

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With a controversial decision, it will justify a rematch getting made, and then this fight will have to get done over with a new set of judges and a different referee. With the good clean cash that will be made with the Cotto-Canelo fight, I wouldn’t be surprised if we see two controversial decisions. I think we’ll be seeing Cotto vs. Canelo for at least three, possibly even four fights.



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