By Dan Ambrose: Junior middleweight Ramon Alvarez (22-4-2, 14 KOs), one of Saul “Canelo” Alvarez’s brothers, defeated 42-year-old journeyman Ben Tackie (30-13-1, 18 KOs) last Saturday night by a 4th round knockout at the Arena Ciudad de Mexico, in Mexico City, Mexico. The 29-year-old Alvarez flurried on the aging Tackie until the referee Jose Guadalupe Garcia stepped in and halted the fight at 1:52 of the 4th round.

Alvarez had his way with Tackie, who was fighting for only the second time in the last five years. Alvarez landed pretty much at will against Tackie, and the only reason the fight didn’t end in the first two rounds was because of Tackie’s ability to absorb punishment. It wasn’t even a fight. Alvarez was hitting Tackie at will from the 1st round, and there was nothing meaningful coming back from him.

Ramon Alvarez’s career is nothing like his brother Canelo’s. Ramon’s previous three fights before last night’s bout against Tackie came against journeyman fighter Richard Gutierrez, Vivian Harris and Omar Chavez. Ramon fights mostly journeyman and lower level guys compared to Canelo, who is obviously fighting world level opposition for the most part except when he’s facing guys like Alfredo Angulo and James Kirkland. Ramon Alvarez was previously beaten by little known fighters Mario Alberto Lozano, Daniel Sandoval and Jesus Aceves.

Unlike Canelo, Ramon doesn’t look huge when he rehydrates for his fights at junior middleweight. Ramon looks more like a natural junior middleweight rather than a big middleweight who dehydrates down to 154 to fight lighter guys. Canelo weighs as much as 175 for his catch-weight fights at 155.

Tackie has now lost 7 out of his last 8 fights. It’s unclear whether he’ll continue his career or not. At 42, there’s really nowhere for Tackie to go. He was a decent fighter years ago when he fought in the light welterweight division, and was one of the top fighters in that weight class. Tackie lost to Kostya Tszyu, Sharmba Mitchell and Ricky Hatton in consecutive fights in 2002 and 2003. Getting those fights was obviously the high point of Tackie’s career. Things went downhill for Tackie not long after those three fights, as he was never able to get back to that level. Tackie’s best career wins came against Roberto Garcia, Golden Johnson, and Freddie Pendleton.