By Dan Ambrose: WBC middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (46-1-1, 32 KOs) has become accustomed to having a weight advantage over many of his opponents during his pro career. I get the distinct feeling that Canelo feels he can’t compete at a high level without having a size advantage over his opponents.
It’s sad if this turns out to be true, because it could mean that Canelo might use catch-weights his entire career in order to get an a constant advantage over his opponents.
Now that Canelo is a world champion in the middleweight division, it looks as if he’s trying to game the system by using a catch-weight of 155lbs as a tool. It’s not coming into play so much for Canelo’s first defense of his WBC title against Amir Khan, because the catch-weight is actually helping Khan out in this situation.
Khan is coming up from the 147lb division, and it is a lot easier for Khan to fight a champion who has melted down to 155 rather than fighting a middleweight champion at the full weight of 160lbs for the division. Where the 155lb catch-weight will wind up hurting Canelo’s opponents is when he starts to defend his WBC title against true middleweights like Gennady Golovkin. He has to drain down to 155. That’s not going to be easy for Golovkin. What is going to make it even tougher for Golovkin is when/if Canelo rehydrates to the 170s or 180s, and enjoys a weight advantage over him.
When Canelo can no longer make his specially made up 155lb catch-weight, which some boxing fans see as the ‘Canelo division,’ he’s going to need to fight at the full weight for the middleweight division at 160. The only way Canelo will be able to get an advantage over his opponents in that weight class would be for him to use his popularity to drag welterweights and in some cases, junior middleweights up to middleweight so that he can fight them.
I think Canelo would be better off fighting at the full weight for the middleweight division or the junior middleweight division if he wants to go back down to that weight class. Canelo needs to stick to the weight boundaries for the class rather than insisting his opponent fights him at a narrow boundary of 155lbs. There will obviously be a risk of failure for Canelo, but at least he would take less criticism. His wins also be seen as more legit due to him fighting guys at their normal weight classes.
Canelo will be fighting Amir Khan (31-3, 19 KOs) at a catch-weight of 155lbs on May 7 at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada. Canelo will have a likely big weight advantage over Khan. Some boxing fans believe Canelo could could come into the ring as high as 185lbs on the night of the fight. That’s a cruiserweight. Khan will probably stand no chance against Canelo if he comes into that fight at that weight.
The sanctioning bodies need to create rehydration rules that keep fighters from gaining back so much weight after they weigh-in. If the sanctioning bodies did that, it would go along ways towards encouraging fighters to fight in their normal weight classes for their body size. In other words, you’ve have less fighters trying to game the system by dehydrating down in weight dramatically to fight in weight classes that aren’t normal for their body size, and then putting the weight back on quickly overnight. The sanctioning bodies should take a lead role in getting the fighters back in their proper weight classes where they belong.
While the sanctioning bodies are at it, they need to do away with catch-weight fights once and for all. It was a nice thing at times early on, but in the last seven years, we’ve seen fighters take advantage of the catch-weights to best fighters that they normally would never be able to beat. Without a catch-weight handicap, we probably would have never seen Manny Pacquiao beat the likes of Antonio Margarito and Miguel Cotto.
It would be interesting to see how guys like Canelo would do if he were forced to fight in the super middleweight division against fighters his own weight. He would be rehydrating to the 170s or 180s just like the super middleweights. He wouldn’t be able to use as size advantage over those fighters though, and he would have to find a new way of winning his fights.
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