Roach: Canelo-Golovkin shouldn’t happen until Canelo fights Cotto again

By Boxing News - 12/23/2015 - Comments

canelo998333333By Dan Ambrose: Trainer Freddie Roach is still complaining about his fighter Miguel Cotto (40-5, 33 KOs) losing his fight against Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (46-1-1, 32 KOs) from last November in Las Vegas, Nevada. Cotto, 35, lost the fight by a 12 round unanimous decision by the scores of 118-110, 119-109 and 117-111.

Roach thinks that the Canelo vs. IBF/IBO/WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin unification fight should not take place next year until Cotto is given a rematch in order to clear up what Roach feels was the controversial scoring for the Cotto-Canelo fight.

Roach also wants a rehydration limit to keep Canelo from rehydrating so much in the rematch with Cotto, because he thinks Canelo rehydrated 30 pounds to the 180s. The chances of Cotto getting Canelo to agree to a rehydration limit are about zero. I don’t think Canelo can fight below the 170s, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he can’t fight below the 180s now.

Canelo looks like he’s gotten heavier recently. I don’t know how he can still drain down all that water weight to get to his favorite 155lb catch-weight that he likes fighting at. It can’t be good for Canelo’s body to be losing all that water weight to make weight, and then quickly putting it back on within 24 hours before his fights.

“They [Canelo] owe us a rematch,” Roach said to Fighthub. “I’d like to get a rematch with a cap on how much weight he [Canelo] can gain, because he must have gained 30 pounds. He [Cotto] was like a little guy to a bigger guy. But I really think they owe us a rematch. The fight was very close. I did think we outscored him. I thought we out-boxed him. The game plan worked well. The thing is I think they owe us one. I don’t think the Triple G fight should happen until they fight us again because of the controversy; 11 rounds to 1? Someone has to ask those people what were you watching, because it wasn’t the same fight I was watching, that’s for sure,” Roach said.

To be sure, Canelo looked the heaviest he’s ever been before. In the past, Canelo has rehydrated to 175 after making weight. But in the Cotto fight, Canelo looked to at least in the 180s in my estimation. I wouldn’t be surprised if Canelo did rehydrate to 185. Canelo made the 155lb catch-weight for the fight. If he did rehydrate to 185, it would help explain why Cotto looked so much smaller than he did.

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Cotto usually comes into his fights in the low 160s. Canelo looked to be at least 20 pounds heavier than him. I thought Canelo looked like a light heavyweight fighting a middleweight. The fight was lost for Cotto on the size alone. His punches had no effect on the much heavier looking Canelo. If the two of them were at the exact same weight, I think Cotto would have won the fight. It still would have been competitive, but I believe Cotto is the better fighter pound-for-pound. Never the less, there was no way that Cotto was going to beat someone the size of Canelo.

Boxing fans generally saw the much heavier looking 25-year-old Canelo winning the fight. Where there were some issues is with the three judges’ wide scoring in favor of Canelo. none of them gave Cotto much of any credit at all for winning rounds. The one judge that scored the fight 119-109 in favor of Canelo had him winning 11 rounds to 1. That just seemed like a very strange score because many of the rounds were competitive, and a lot of boxing fans thought Cotto deserved to win 5 rounds at least.

“We did have trouble keeping him [Canelo] off a little bit because he was so big. He moved us back more than we moved him back,” Roach said. “It wasn’t possible for us to push that big guy back because he’s so heavy. That’s why I came with the game plan to out-box him, because I anticipated him coming in big in the fight. Miguel never complained about the size at all. He just smiles at me when I talk about a rematch. We don’t have anything going on right now, but we’re not done yet. It’s still a bit too soon,” Roach said.

Roach says that Cotto smiles at him each time he talks to him about wanting to push for a rematch with Canelo. I think it’s quite possible that Cotto doesn’t see a rematch with Canelo being feasible. Canelo usually moves on after his fights when he wins. It would probably be a big waste of time for Cotto to try and get a rematch, because Canelo is going in a different direction now towards a fight against Golovkin at some point.

It’s in Canelo’s best interest to give up on his 155lb catch-weight fights for the Golovkin bout. If the 155lb catch-weight is keeping Canelo from really rehydrating to an bigger weight, I think he’s better off weighing in at the full weight for the middleweight division at 160, and then rehydrating to 190 or whatever Canelo can come in at.

If Canelo rehydrates to 190, he would have a significant weight advantage over Golovkin, who only rehydrates to around 170 for his middleweight fights. Do the math. Canelo would have a 20 pound weight advantage over Golovkin if he can rehydrate to 190.



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