By: Sean Crose
He’s only 34, which isn’t really that old by modern boxing standards. But Saul “Canelo” Alvarez, the man who is still arguably the king of boxing, has been fighting professionally since he was 15. That’s 65 fights in a career that spans nearly two decades. Put simply, that’s a lot of boxing. Maybe that’s why people now consider the red-haired star a bit too old. Boxing has a way of paying off, after all. But legends, even old ones, die hard.
That’s why some might argue that it’s unwise to simply dismiss the 61-2-2 multi-division title. Yes, Canelo hasn’t seemed as hot as he has in recent years, and yes, there are those who think he’s been distancing himself from boxer David Benavidez, but Canelo has more experience facing top-tier opponents than almost any fighter in history. Floyd Mayweather, Gennady Golovkin, Daniel Jacobs, Sergey Kovalev, Dmitry Bivol. Those names are just some of the notable opponents Canelo has faced over the years. The fact that he’s beaten the majority of them is self-evident.
It’s perhaps no surprise that the man is the heavy favorite to outbox Edgar Berlanga when the two meet on Saturday night in Los Vegas for Canelo’s super middleweight world title. While New York’s Berlanga is younger and perhaps bigger than Canelo, he has never faced anyone of Canelo’s caliber before – not even an older Canelo. But the Canelo-Berlanga fight will be on pay-per-view. Canelo, like Mayweather before him, fights for pay-per-view. That’s one of the perks of greatness in the ring.
Still, the odds of Canelo-Berlanga being a big pay-per-view success are slim. He may have pulled in two million buys when he fought Mayweather more than a decade ago, but Berlanga isn’t a top name. And this is an era where only the biggest names bring in the biggest numbers. Not that Canelo cares. Again, he’s been in this game a long time, and he’s basically been calling the shots for years now.
Canelo is stubborn, too – or is that good marketing sense? He has no intention of becoming one of the countless fighters who have gone bankrupt because they were unwilling or unable to decide on a career path. For that, frankly, he deserves credit.
