By Huck Allen: Trainer Robert Garcia predicts a knockout victory for Canelo Alvarez over Caleb Plant in their undisputed 168-lb contest on November 6th at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.
Garcia says Canelo WBA/WBC/WBO 168-lb champ (56-1-2, 38 KOs) will stop IBF super middleweight champion Plant (21-0, 12 KOs) with a body shot.
Although Garcia does believe Plant will do better than Canelo’s last opponent Billy Joe Saunders, he doesn’t think he’s got enough talent to win. Canelo is on another level and “unbeatable,” according to Robert.
Plant is pulling out all the stops to try and get the victory, and he’s enlisted the help of boxing guru Andre Ward to give him some good tips to help secure the win.
With his recent wins over Saunders, Avni Yildirim, Callum Smith, and Sergey Kovalev, Canelo has looked good lately. However, none of those fighters are in the same league as Plant, and we may have been seeing a mirage when he Canelo.
When a fighter faces lesser opposition, as Canelo has in the last three years, they look like stars. But when you shine the light on them, you realize they’re not as good as you once thought.
“There’s always a chance, of course. Anything can happen in boxing, but I think Canelo stops Caleb Plant,” said Robert Garcia to Fighthub. “I think body, yeah.
“I think he’ll [Plant] do better than Saunders. I think he’s a better boxer. He does better. Well, ones a lefty [Billy Joe], but I think Caleb does better,” said Robert.
It will be difficult for Canelo to land his body shots with Plant not presenting a stationary target for him. If you’ve seen Plant’s fights, he doesn’t stand there and let his opponents hit him the way some of Canelo’s recent opposition has been doing.
Yildirim, Saunders, Callum Smith, and Rocky Fielding stood in front of Canelo and let him tee off on them with body shots. Plant isn’t going to do that because he’s intelligent, disciplined and he knows he can’t fight by turning himself into a punching bag.
“I feel that the only one that could cause him problems and at some point beat him is Benavidez,” said Robert Garcia.
“David] is a very tall fighter, very brave, and he is not afraid to go forward.
“I think it could bring a lot of trouble to someone like Canelo. I still believe that Canelo would win, but it could give him some headaches,” said Garcia about his belief that Benavidez will put Alvarez to the test.
If Canelo waits too long before finally fighting Benavidez, he’s going to lose.
Right now, Benavidez is 24 and not even in his prime. You can’t say that about the 31-year-old Canelo, and he’s at his best now. So if he waits four or five years before finally agreeing to fight Benavidez, he’ll have problems.
If I go back I won’t make it out again so it’s a one way trip for me. pic.twitter.com/8zI1v38Apq
— CalebPlant (@SweetHandsPlant) September 18, 2021