Giving Canelo Alvarez His Respect!

By Bradley “The Bulldog” Johnson

I am human. I am a fan of certain athletes and fighters. Sometimes I am a fan due to their fighting styles, sometimes their back story and the way they grew up, and other times just because of their personality and the way they carry themselves. For some of those same reasons there are times we don’t particularly like and or gravitate towards a certain athlete or fighter.

All too often as humans we don’t like a fighter or even a whole sports organization just due to the cockiness of its fans. Sometimes we may end up disliking a fighter by default of being a rival to a particular fighter that we may favor.

In the case of Canelo Alvarez, 49-1-2, 34 KO’s, I never particularly disliked him. I just couldn’t find a reason to really like him. At times I found him to be overhyped and sometimes overrated. Maybe it was his close fights with Austin Trout and Erislandy Lara where he was given the nod. Maybe the fact that Saul was supposed to be a Legitimate match for self-proclaimed “TBE” Floyd “Money” Mayweather, JR. and instead looked like an amateur who forgot the blueprint he was supposedly handed. In a fight I couldn’t find one round to give to Canelo, Adalaide Byrd some how found the fight 114-114 and a draw. Cards like that only further the suspicion of boxing fans looking for a reason to scream foul play.

That suspicion was furthered when that same judge gave Canelo 10 out of 12 rounds verse Gennady Golovkin, in a fight many boxing fans thought “GGG” was the clear winner. To me that’s a fight where I would like to be giving praise to Canelo Alvarez on a well fought close loss. 8 rounds to 4, or 7-5 is a fair assessment in my opinion. Instead the controversial draw caused more harm to Canelo’s legacy than help.

With all that being said, its of no fault of his own that the judges (one in particular) seem to favor him and his style. We too often take it out on the fighter that benefited off the mistakes of the judges rather than just blame the judging squarely. We blamed Timothy Bradley for the bad judging against Manny Pacquiao. Then blamed Jeff Horn for once again some perceived bad judging that worked against the favor of Manny Pacquiao. Some blamed Manny Pacquiao for earning a draw Vs Juan Manuel Marquez, and the list goes on and on.

Truth is Canelo did deserve recognition for a well fought fight against Gennady Golovkin. He displayed some wonderful boxing skills and defense against one of the best pound for pound boxers in the world and middleweight champion. “GGG” has stopped 33 of 36 opponents coming into that fight and looked like an unstoppable wrecking ball most of the time. The only fighter to go the distance with him recently, was former national amateur stand out and #3 middleweight in the world Danny Jacobs. Point being is that is no small feat! I’d also like to add Canelo Alvarez may have one of the most impressive resumes of current boxers if not the most impressive. 33 out of Canelo’s last 34 opponent have winning records and 28 out of 34 opponents had 4 losses or less.

Canelo Alvarez has entered his prime and looks great. Now whether this up and coming fight with “GGG” ends in a win, loss, or draw, he is still one of the top p4p boxers in the world. Canelo looks like he has quite a few solid years left to be amongst boxing royalty and will be a challenge for anyone in the middleweight division for years to come. So, although I and others may question a couple scorecards, Canelo’s dedication to himself and the sport of boxing is one of an elite athlete that should be recognized and commended.

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