Canelo Alvarez shook the boxing game up last week when he left Showtime and signed a long term deal with HBO. The extent of the deal has not completely been released but its basis is for Canelo to fight three times a year, twice on pay-per-view and once on regular HBO. News broke yesterday that the rumored Canelo Alvarez-Joshua Clottey fight is no longer an option as Canelo has a lingering ankle injury that will force him not to be ready for the December date. Through his Instagram page, Canelo mentioned in Spanish that he will be fighting in May.
Now all scenarios, all roads lead to Miguel Cotto-Canelo Alvarez fighting next year in May on HBO pay-per-view as Cotto himself has took the rest of the year off after his dominating win over Sergio Martinez. Now a Cotto-Canelo fight would not likely be makeable had Canelo stuck with Showtime as Cotto works with Top Rank and Top Rank hasn’t been on Showtime since 2012 unless it was a purse bid fight of some sort.
ThaBoxingVoice.com spoke with the former longtime HBO commentator Larry Merchant on his opinions of the moves made by Canelo Alvarez.
“I think it’s a good move for Canelo,” Merchant told ThaBoxingVoice.com. “Whether it’s a great move for boxing or not depends on who he fights and how he fights. That could be anywhere. I’ve always been a Canelo fan since we first saw him as a teenager. I love the fact that he’s one of the few fighters out there that’s looking to fight all the best opponents. The fact that he’ll be on HBO not just pay-per-view follows the path that Oscar De La Hoya paved in the 90’s.”
Merchant feels the formula will build Canelo into a superstar should he win and especially because the two biggest draws in boxing, Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao are near the end of their road.
“You get a lot of fans to see you and build your fan base and of course presumably building first to a fight with Cotto. That would be a big event for boxing, depending on how he does and what happens over the next decade as the two main pay-per-view fighters, Pacquiao and Mayweather fade into the record books,” explained Merchant.
Canelo made it clear, he wants to take back the May and September Mexican boxing dates that for years have belonged to Floyd Mayweather. A fight with Miguel Cotto is the biggest makeable fight in boxing and all signals are pointing to it happening in May. The question was posed to Merchant what could Mayweather do to out stage Cotto-Canelo if it wasn’t fighting Manny Pacquiao?
“I think that Mayweather has been clever enough to want those dates because of the nature and background of most of the fighters he’s fought,” stated Merchant. “ I don’t think he needs those dates unless he’s fighting a Mexican or a Latino fighter. They are increasingly fewer good options for him as opponents and maybe that forces him to try and make a fight with Pacquiao. I’m not a real expert on that because I’ve got it wrong every time someone has asked me if that fight was going to happen. Pacquiao himself is getting older. As they get older things happen. It wouldn’t be the shock of my life if one of them lost before they fight each other. “
