By Tim Royner: In an ominous sign of an impending mismatch, WBO junior middleweight champion Miguel Cotto (41-5, 33 KOs) is building up his opponent welterweight Sadam Ali (25-1, 14 KOs) by calling him “great” ahead of their fight this Saturday night at Madison Square Garden in New York.
HBO World Championship Boxing will be televising the Cotto-Ali fight on Saturday night at 10pm ET.
This is fight that is expected to be a one-sided affair with Cotto hitting the over-matched Sadam Ali at will before the slaughter is eventually stopped by the referee at some point.
Ali, 29, comes into the fight having recently been knocked out in the 9th round by the light hitting Jessie Vargas last year in March 2016. And while it’s true that Ali has won his last 3 fights, the victories have come against lower level opposition.
“Sadam Ali is a good boxer and a great fighter,” said Cotto to Fight News. ” We will do our best.”
Cotto could have done much better than Ali. If Golden Boy Promotions had offered guys the fight against Cotto in a one-fight deal without them needing to agree to other fights, they probably would have gotten someone much better than Sadam Ali. It’s unclear whether the idea all along was to get someone that was no threat to beating Cotto. If that’s the case, then guys like Errol Spence Jr., Mikey Garcia and Kell Brook never had a chance in the first place to get the fight. Brook said he was close to agreeing to the fight, but he ultimately rejected it.
“I have no regrets in my career. I appreciate my whole career, it was a tough career,” said Cotto.
Cotto might not have regrets, but there were a lot of fights that should have taken place. Instead of Cotto fighting guys like Daniel Geale, Yuri Foreman, Ricardo Mayorga, Delvin Rodriguez, Antonio Margarito [in the rematch], Michael Jennings and Alfonso Gomez, it would have been better to have seen him fight higher quality opposition.
Cotto never fought Gennady Golovkin, Jermell Charlo, Jermall Charlo, Erislandy Lara, Jarrell Hurd, Errol Spence Jr., Keith Thurman, Daniel Jacobs or Shawn Porter.
“The Mosley fight was my first big victory. The Mosley fight was the best one for me,” said Cotto.
Cotto’s win over the past his best Shane Mosley in 2007 was a controversial one, as there are many boxing fans that though that the results of that fight should have gone the other way. Mosley came into the Cotto fight having recently been beaten 4 times by Winky Wright [x 2] and Vernon Forrest [x 2]. Career-wise, Mosley wasn’t the same guy that had beaten Oscar De La Hoya and Fernando Vargas twice. Mosley was slipping badly by the time he fought Cotto.
Cotto’s best win of his 10-year pro career wasn’t against Mosley, and wasn’t against Sergio Martinez, Margarito, Foreman or Mayorga. Those guys were either old or injured. Cotto’s best win of his career was against Joshua Clottey in 2009, and that was a VERY close 12 round split decision.
Cotto’s other wins were mostly against beat up or old guys that had seen better days like Mosley, Margarito, Foreman and Zab Judah. Cotto beat an old Judah, and he hit him with a lot of blows. The low blows turned the fight around for Cotto. He was struggling against Judah until he started hurting him with low blows.
Cotto’s best wins:
• Joshua Clottey
• Paulie Malignaggi
• Randall Bailey
• Oktay Urkal
Cotto’s worst wins:
• Zab Judah
• Daniel Geale
• Yuri Foreman
• Antonio Margarito
• Delvin Rodriguez
• Sergio Martinez
Cotto’s worst career losses:
• Austin Trout
• Floyd Mayweather Jr.
• Antonio Margarito
• Manny Pacquiao
• Saul Canelo Alvarez
