By Dan Ambrose: Amir Khan (31-3, 19 KOs) says he’s having no problems putting on muscle weight and developing his punching power for his May 7 fight against Saul Canelo Alvarez (46-1-1, 32 KOs) in their catch-weight fight at 155lb.
Khan says that Canelo will feel every punch he hits him with, and he thinks he’s going to be able to hurt the 25-year-old with his new punching power. Khan says he’s the more talented fighter than Canelo and he can’t wait to show the boxing world that when he gets the slower, flat-footed Canelo in the ring in their HBO pay-per-view televised fight from the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Khan thinks he’ll be able to hurt Canelo with his power shots. Khan might be right. We saw how Floyd Mayweather Jr. was able to hurt Canelo in their fight three years ago, and Mayweather doesn’t have the kind of power that Khan has. Mayweather wasn’t bulked up either when he fought Canelo. Mayweather focused on speed and throwing a lot of shots.
“I know I can go into this fight, especially against Canelo and win it because I’m more gifted than him, I have a better skill set than him, and it’s all about just being smart and win this fight smartly,” said Khan to Fighthub.com. “Look, I might not be as strong as Canelo in the fight but I know that every shot I hit him with he’s going to feel it. He’s going to feel every shot.”
Canelo is a good counter puncher with nice punching power. He’s not the greatest counter puncher in the middleweight division, and he’s definitely not the hardest puncher in this weight class. However, Canelo is fighting a pumped up welterweight, and that will likely give him a huge advantage in this fight. When a fighter comes up from a lower weight class, they’re frequently not used to getting hit by bigger fighters. They also don’t always carry their power up with them when they do move up in weight. That might be the case of Khan. But if he can hit Canelo with faster shots than what he’s been getting hit with in the past, then we could see an upset on May 7.
“It’s coming along amazingly. At first I thought maybe it could be a problem putting on the weight, putting on the muscle, but you know I’ve worked so hard.,” said Khan. “I’ve worked day-in and day-out very hard to make sure that I’m going to go into this fight strong. And the speed’s still there, the power has improved a lot.”
Khan putting on weight doesn’t mean he’s going to be hitting harder than he was before. Some fighters end up with more power when they move up in weight, but many others wind up just the same as they were before and slower than they were. Khan’s main asset is his hand speed and mobility. If he loses that due to the weight he’s put on, then he would wind up getting beaten down and suffering another knockout loss.
If Canelo loses this fight, it’s going to be a huge shock to him and to his promoters at Golden Boy, because he could have chosen to fight Gennady Golovkin on May 7 and picked up a far bigger payday against him. But instead, Canelo and Golden Boy handpicked Khan from the welterweight division, obviously thinking they had an easy mark in the British fighter. A defeat to Khan to would be bad for Canelo, because he could see his earning power drop off after this loss and it might take him a couple years to build his way back up to where he is now.