By: Sean Crose
Oscar De La Hoya was not impressed with the performance of his former favorite student Canelo Alvarez against arch-rival Gennady Golovkin last September. Canelo easily defeated Golovkin in their third battle, but De Ha Hoya said exaggerated fighting Canelo should not have won the decision. “It was boring,” De La Hoya said of the super middleweight title fight. “It’s really slow. I really expected Canelo to take him down… and that’s exactly what he should do.” As far as De La Hoya knows, Canelo at his best has eliminated Golovkin of 2022. De La Hoya said: “If Canelo throws three, four, five combo punches, and emphasizes action and conditionally, he will take down GGG with his hands.”
De La Hoya admits Golovkin’s age may have something to do with the Kazakh fighters’ less-than-stellar in-ring performances. “He was forty years old,” De Ha Hoya said of Golovkin. “Bernard Hopkins was a young man forty.” De La Hoya made it clear that Golovkin couldn’t keep time changing, but Canelo could have taken advantage of Golovkin’s age. “Father time will catch up with you, that’s it,” said De La Hoya. “If Canelo had taken advantage of that, he would have taken him down.”
Although few if any observers felt Golovkin looked great in battle in September, De La Hoya points out that the man may have a way back to redemption. “The match against Jaime Munguia will be the perfect choice for both of them,” he said. “Golovkin defeating a Jaime Munguia will get him back to the top…among the die-hard boxing fans, he will be on top of the world again.” As for Canelo, De La Hoya was not critical of his performance last September. “As a fan,” he said, “I don’t like Canelo blabbing that he doesn’t want to fight Mexican boxers.”
De La Hoya is still confused on the matter. “I don’t really understand it,” he said. “I think any Mexican boxer out there with a name, a track record, a world title, could be very dangerous for Canelo.” The man who has been dubbed the “Golden Boy” during his ring career may feel this is especially true as Canelo failed to impress him in the third matchup against Golovkin. “The first and second fights were a lot better,” he said. “It seems like if Canelo can’t get into second then maybe he’s worried about the air conditioning.” And why is that so? “Maybe something happened in his camp,” De La Hoya said.
