(Photo Credit: Eye of the Tiger Management) By Dan Ambrose: David Lemieux (34-3, 31 KOs) is dead certain that he’ll be facing WBC middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez in the near future. Lemieux is co-promoted by Golden Boy Promotions, who also promotes Canelo.
Lemieux says that he will definitely be facing Canelo. Lemieux isn’t saying when the fight with Canelo will be taking place, but it wouldn’t be at all surprising if it happens this year in September on the Mexican Independence Day holiday weekend, because that’s when Canelo will be fighting after his fight with Amir Khan on May 7.
“I am going to cross paths with Canelo one day. It’s for sure,” Lemieux said to espn.com.
It’s a no-brainer that Golden Boy would put Lemieux in with Canelo, because it’s not likely they have a ton of other options. You see where Golden Boy is right now in terms of match-making for the 25-year-old Canelo. They’re resorting to putting Canelo in with fighters from the welterweight division in Amir Khan. Just last year, Golden Boy brought inactive fighter James Kirkland back from a year and a half layoff to fight Canelo.
Technically, Kirkland wasn’t retired, but when you’re out of the ring for as long as him, it’s kind of the same thing. Golden Boy doesn’t have a lot of options for Canelo other than putting him in with dangerous guys like Gennady Golovkin, Daniel Jacobs, Demetrius Andrade, Erislandy Lara or the Charlo brothers. It doesn’t look like Golden Boy wants to do that. That’s why someone like Lemieux is so valuable. He’s probably someone Golden Boy can match against Canelo two or three times depending on how one-sided their fight is.
Canelo will have an easy time beating Lemieux as well if he fights as timidly against him as he did against Golovkin. Lemieux would have to let his hands go immediately against Canelo otherwise the fight would wind up as a mismatch with Canelo working him over. Canelo doesn’t have a jab like Golovkin, so he would need to get his hands dirty by getting into the trenches and taking some big shots from Lemieux in order to get the victory. I still see Canelo winning pretty easily because he’s a good body puncher, and Lemieux seems to have problems taking hard body shots. Golovkin twice hurt Lemieux with body shots and he wasn’t even trying a lot to the body. It was just that Lemieux couldn’t handle the few body shots that he threw in the fight.
Lemieux will be fighting an important bout this Saturday night on March 12 against James De La Rosa (23-3, 13 KOs) on Fox Deportes starting at 7 pm ET at Montreal’s Olympia Theatre. This is Lemieux’s first fight since he was stopped in the 8th round by Golovkin last October.
Lemieux cannot afford to lose this contest if he wants to get the big money Canelo payday fight, as well as some of the other matches. It took Lemieux four years to come back from his back to back defeats at the hands of Marco Antonio Rubio and Joachim Alcine. Coming from the loss to Golovkin won’t be as hard because Lemieux didn’t take a huge hit in terms of his popularity with that defeat. But if he loses to De La Rosa on Saturday, then he will definitely take a major hit.
“This is definitely going to be an action fight,” Lemieux said. De La Rosa will either go backwards or he might just come at me. But once he feels my shots, I don’t think he’s going to want to come at me much. We’re going to be ready for all circumstances come March 12. I’m well prepared. I’m not worried about anything De La Rosa is going to bring. He’s a well-rounded fighter. I could see it in his eyes in the press conference in Montreal that he really wants to win this fight. So he’s going to come with fire in his heart. It’s going to be exciting. I’m excited for the challenge. It’s going to be great,” said Lemieux.
As for Lemieux’s loss to Golovkin, he says “I’m just coming back from a big fight, but I’ve moved on. I am ready to step into the ring to win.”
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