By Sean Jones: Eddie Hearn predicts a late stoppage for undisputed super middleweight champion Canelo Alvarez this Saturday night in his title defense against the smaller 154-lb fighter Jermell Charlo.
If Hearn’s prediction of a Canelo (59-2-2, 39 KOs) knockout plays out like he says, the Mexican star will be proving many of his doubters wrong, as there are a whole bunch that believe he’s lost a few steps and is there for the taking.
The Canelo-Charlo event isn’t cheap. It goes for $84.99 on Showtime pay-per-view. Granted, it’s a far better fight than Canelo’s last PPV bout against John Ryder, but still, many fans will be reluctant to pay that kind of money for the top-loaded event.
A better price would be in the $30 range, and trim some of the uneeded undercard fights to give fans a cheaper price.
Undercard:
- Jesus Ramos Jr. vs. Erickson Lubin
- Yordenis Ugas vs. Mario Barrios
- Elijah Garcia vs. Jose Armando Resendiz
Canelo will stop Jermell
“Everything I’m hearing from Saul in the build-up to this fight is he’s going to be too big and too strong for Charlo, to be honest with you, but Charlo’s a very good fighter,” said Eddie Hearn to Fight Hub TV about his belief Canelo Alvarez will have too much for Jermell Charlo on Saturday.
“Canelo Alvarez will stop him actually late in the fight. I guess he has a little bit to prove. When you look at his last three performances, Bivol Gennady and Ryder, but don’t forget he had wrist surgery.
“I’m sure he’s had a few other issues with his knee and stuff like that. So I think you’re going to get a motivated Canelo Alvarez in this fight, and I expect him to beat triumphant.
“I think so. If Canelo is not where he was four or five fights ago, I think Charlo is a live dog in the fight for sure, but I think I just feel like Canelo will be motivated for this fight, and I expect and I hope he can be victorious,” said Hearn.
Alvarez will show what he has left
“That’s always a possibility, but I think when you come through injuries and stuff like that, you’ve got to expect,” said Hearn when asked if his thoughts about John Ryder saying that Canelo is showing signs of decline.
It could be that Canelo’s sting of lackluster performances in his last three fights were a product of his left wrist injury, but that still doesn’t explain the fatigue that we witnessed.
Even if Alvarez did have a wrist problem, why did he gas out in the first three to six rounds in his fights with Dmitry Bivol, Gennadiy Golovkin, and John Ryder?
“The last fight against Ryder was off the back of wrist surgery, so I don’t think that was a bad performance,” said Hearn. “I think I think we will learn everything we need to know on September 30th, but like I said, I expect him to win.”
The wrist problem shouldn’t have affected Canelo’s cardiovascular system, and it also should have caused him to load up on single kill shots.
If anything, Canelo should have worked harder on his cardio and focused on throwing light combinations instead of loading up on single punches and going for knockout blows.
“I think in the situation and the age of Terence Crawford, he’s got to continue to chase greatness, and he’s got to look for the biggest fights out there. Obviously, that’s a big fight for him financially,” Hearn said about Canelo.
“As good as Terence Crawford is, I think the only way he gets beaten is by moving too far out of his weight class, and I think that is the fight that gets him beat, but he’s a brilliant fighter.
“Having dealt with Canelo, I don’t see him ever fighting a pound under 168 ever again, and I don’t see Terence Crawford; I know he says he’ll fight at 168, but I know Canelo’s going to be 180 in the ring plus. I’m not sure that’s a great idea.
“Yeah, that’s true,” said Hearn when told that Crawford said that ‘skills win fights.’ “You see a lot of great fighters who get beat by moving up the weight class. I think for Vasily Lomachenko, he’s really a super featherweight. He started his career at 126 pounds.
“Even the guys like Rigondeaux and people like that, they have to move up, and I think Inoue will be the same. I think you’ll see Inoue get beat at featherweight or super feather just because of the weight discrepancy, and you wouldn’t really want to see Terence get beaten because he was just too light.
“Look, I think it’s great that people want to chase those big fights, and good luck to him. You think about the dynamic. Spence has exercised his rematch clause. Crawford’s not with PBC. Yeah, I don’t see it happening right now,” said Hearn.
Big Charlo could be next
“I think next would be the other Charlo [Jermall]. I think that Canelo will be offered, I guess, a string of opponents, and he’ll choose who it is, but I just think from a narrative point of view to fight, the brother after you beat the other one would make sense, and I think that’s a fight that Canelo and Eddy Reynoso would be comfortable with,” Hearn said.
Canelo will anger many boxing fans if he picks the slurring Jermall Charlo for his next fight because he hasn’t fought in 2 1/2 years and looked dreadful in his last in 2021 against Juan Macias Montiel.
Fans want to see Canelo show some courage by fighting one of these killers next:
- Dmitry Bivol
- David Benavidez
- Demetrius Andrade
- Terence Crawford
- David Morrell Jr.
- Artur Beterbiev
- Diego Pacheco
“Maybe Errol Spence. They talk about the weight. I don’t know. It could be anybody. I don’t be surprised,” said Hearn about Spence potentially being an opponent for Canelo after his fight with Jermell & Jermall.
If Canelo picks Errol Spence as his next opponent after Jermell, he’s going to have the fans storming the Bastille coming after him. No one wants to see Canelo hand-picking Spence.
The only way that fight makes sense is if Canelo vacates all his 168-lb titles and tells his fans, ‘See, I don’t have any belts anymore, so I can give you the fights you want.’ That’ll be hilarious hearing Canelo trying to explain why he’s fighting Spence rather than Benavidez, Morrell, or Bivol.
“I think that’s a big fight, but we’ll see. You could be talking about an Edgar Berlanga fight, a Munguia fight on DAZN, or you could be talking about a Chris Eubank or Conor Benn and something in the UK,” said Hearn when asked who he would match Canelo with if he comes back to Matchroom.
If all Hearn has to offer Canelo are fights against Benn, Eubank Jr., Berlanga & Munguia, hopefully, he doesn’t re-sign with him because those are terrible matches.
“Sooner or later, his [Canelo] career will come to an end. Maybe that will be after these three fights. Maybe he gets beat after September 30th. You never known in boxing,”said Hearn.
“From my point of view, we did six fights with him. I think we did a great job. He was a pleasure to work with, and hopefully, one day, we can work with him again,” said Hearn about Canelo.
