By Jim Maltzman: Golden Boy Promotions matchmaker Roberto Diaz isn’t ruling out September 12th for Canelo Alvarez’s next fight, but he has doubts whether he’ll fight on that date.
Diaz says it’s getting a little too close to the September 12th date, which falls on the Mexican Independence Day holiday weekend.
Canelo’s next fight will be taking place behind closed doors, and there isn’t going to be a lot of money to pay for his opponents without the gate revenue. That’s the bind that Alvarez and Golden Boy Promotions are in right now. They want a quality fighter, but the money isn’t there.
Canelo could face a plan-B opponent
If it comes down to money, Canelo could wind up facing the best available fighter for the money. It would be someone like John Ryder, Tureano Johnson, Jason Quigley, or Willie Monroe Jr. If plan-A were Callum Smith, then Plan-B would be the like of Ryder, Tureano, Quigley, or Monroe Jr.
The problem for Canelo is the lack of money to get a good opponent for him to fight in September. WBO super middleweight champion Billy Joe Saunders is rumored to have been offered only $2 million for the Canelo fight, which is far from the massive paydays that Danny Jacobs and Sergey Kovalev both received to fight him. They were said to have gotten eight figures to face Alvarez.
“That’s still up in the air. I think September 12th is getting too close to where it’ not possible, but hopefully, it is,” said Roberto Diaz of Golden Boy to IFL TV on Canelo’s next fight.
“Canelo is still training. He’s always training. It’s just a matter of getting it done, and hopefully, we get it done soon. A lot of fans around the world are waiting to see a big fight.”
Callum Smith, the WBA super-middleweight champion, is said to be the leading candidate to get the fight. However, he’s someone that will want to be paid well, and he certainly isn’t going to accept less than what he feels he’s worth.
Diaz remains optimistic that Canelo (53-1-2, 36 KO) can still fight on that date, but he’s not sure that he can. If Canelo doesn’t compete in September, it would be the second consecutive year in which he’s missed fighting on that date. Last year, Canelo fought in November in defeating WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev by an 11th round knockout.
Alvarez still has time
There’s now less than a month to go before Canelo’s September 12th date, and that’s not a lot of time to get boxing fans excited about seeing him fight. However, Canelo and Golden Boy Promotions won’t need to sell tickets, so there’s less concern about announcing his next fight well in advance of September 12th.
In theory, Golden Boy can wait until the week of Canelo’s September 12th flight, and it would still do well if they promoted it well. It would help if Canelo fought a decent opponent like Callum Smith, but we’ll see.
Maybe Golden Boy will surprise us by revealing that Alvarez is fighting Callum or perhaps a quality light heavyweight like Dmitry Bivol, Jean Pascal, Marcus Browne, or Artur Beterbiev.
For boxing fans accustomed to seeing Canelo fight top-level opposition, they might not be happy if he fails to fight a perfect guy. You can’t blame Canelo if he faces someone a little on the weaker side, given that there isn’t a gate and that this is the middle of the pandemic.
It doesn’t matter how popular Canelo is, you’re not going to get the best for him during the pandemic. The money won’t be there this time unless DAZN chooses to pay top dollar to help him get a name fighter like Bivol, Callum, Beterbiev, Browne or Pascal.