Floyd Mayweather Will Fight Canelo Alvarez Next, but the Real Danger is Down Below Welterweight

Regardless of what you hear and read in the media, Floyd Mayweather’s next opponent is probably going to be Saul “Canelo” Alvarez.
Alvarez, who will be 23 by the proposed September 14 fight date, is a strong, fresh two-belt junior middleweight champion bursting with confidence after decisioning Austin Trout on April 20 in a jam-packed Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas.
On paper, Alvarez could be, literally, Mayweather’s biggest test ever. The red-headed native of Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico routinely shows up on fight night above 170 lbs. and, if/when the Mayweather bout is made, it could mean Mayweather would likely be outweighed by more than twenty pounds by the time both fighters make their ring walks.
Stylistically, Mayweather has every edge over the methodical and relatively slow-footed Alvarez. Once Mayweather gets on the bicycle and finds his rhythm, he should cruise to a solid decision win, even against a walking wall like Alvarez
The public argument we see about weight is mere posturing as both fighters attempt to flex their muscles in negotiations to get the best deal possible for themselves.
Mayweather may try to demand that Alvarez compete at 147, but Alvarez will not likely bend. And, despite the fact that it may give him a twitch in the gizzard to concede, Mayweather will likely have to give in and meet Canelo at 154 or at some agreeable catchweight limit.
Whether or not Mayweather sold a million pay-per-views against Robert Guerrero on May 4, the show didn’t exactly electrify the boxing world. Showtime and everyone involved with the business end of Mayweather’s six-fight deal with the network will want a real blockbuster next-and the only person who can bring that kind of interest to the table is Canelo Alvarez.
As Mayweather always says, people lie, but numbers don’t. The young Mexican battler is, quite possibly, the only commercially viable opponent for a big ticket pay-per-view event.
But, again, Mayweather need not worry. The end of his undefeated streak won’t come against Alvarez or any other larger fighter.
The end of Mayweather’s unblemished, pristine record will come against one of the young, hungry warriors in the unbelievably deep junior welterweight division.
Forget about these one punch guys who will have ten to twenty pounds on Mayweather by fight night-the bigger they are, the slower they are. The added bulk will keep them one step behind a Mayweather, who is legitimately slowing down at 36 years of age.
The real danger is in young fighters who are quick, technically sound, and whose smaller size will give Floyd a false sense of confidence.
We know that Mayweather is infinitely faster than Canelo Alvarez and have seen him beat several high-end welterweights with his reflexes. But what about a guy who hits like a welter, but throws quick punches and is lighter on his feet?
A guy like Lucas Matthysse, who has legitimate one-punch power, but is also a deceptively good technical fighter, could give Mayweather some real problems.
The Argentine “Machine” has also become a well-seasoned pro while jumping through hoops to earn his shot at a world title. His recent total destruction of durable and crafty Lamont Peterson was a wakeup call to the world and it erased the ugliness of two highly controversial decision losses from when a greener version of himself lost to bicycling southpaws, Zab Judah and Devon Alexander.
Since those losses, Matthysse has looked unbeatable and surely as impressive as anyone Mayweather has fought in a long while.
Other than Matthysse, junior welter is full of good, quality opponents.
Danny Garcia could make for a better battle than Robert Guerrero or Victor Ortiz. Buzzsaw battlers, Mike Alvarado and Brandon Rios, could give Mayweather fits because of their tenacity and aggression, but both are Top Rank fighters and not likely to be considered. Amir Khan, despite several real knocks against him, has the hand speed and athleticism that could make for a surprisingly solid match-up. Even the recently crushed Lamont Peterson could get back on solid ground to give Mayweather a real bout.
So, while fans naturally want to see Mayweather fight bigger opposition, it should be pointed out that bigger isn’t necessarily better-especially for a fighter like Mayweather, who depends on speed and reflexes. Forget 154, there is a world of hurt to be had at 140. (Source)

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Froch beats Kessler to retain IBF super middleweight title



Britain’s Carl Froch got his revenge with victory over Denmark’s Mikkel Kessler in a unanimous points decision to retain the IBF super middleweight title in a thrilling clash at a packed 02 Arena on Saturday.
The 35-year-old Froch, who lost to Kessler in Denmark three years ago, put on a typically gutsy performance to win with a scorecard that read 115-113, 116-112 and 118-110 in favour of the Nottingham fighter to the delight of the 20,000 crowd.
Froch’s record is now 31-2, with his only other defeat coming at the hands of American Andre Ward in Atlantic City in 2011, compared to Kessler’s 46-3 after an action-packed fight that saw the Dane hanging on near the end of the final round.
“It feels really, really good, only thing that feels bad is I have had to beat a real gentleman and a nice man, Mikkel Kessler,” Froch told Sky Sports. “It’s 1-1 now, who knows do you fancy a third one? Best of three maybe?
“I deserved to win, but he won’t lie down for any man and massive respect to him,” added Froch before turning his thoughts to a possible rematch with unbeaten WBA title holder Ward who was watching at ringside.
“The winner of this fight should be moving on to avenge their other loss and now I move on to the second best boxer in the world,” said Froch. “Let’s get Andre Ward over to the UK and fight him here.”
The 34-year-old Kessler, whose only other defeats were against unbeaten Welshman Joe Calzaghe in 2007 and Ward in 2009, said: “I gave it my all but didn’t have the energy and couldn’t cope with Carl. It is nice to fight such a warrior.” (Read the original story)

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Groves makes big statement with knockout win



George Groves took another significant step towards a world title shot in the crowded super-middleweight division with a fifth-round knockout of the dangerous Noe Gonzalez on Saturday.
Following Tony Bellew’s narrow victory over Isaac Chilemba earlier in the night, Groves delivered another popular home victory for the noisy O2 Arena crowd with a stunning right-hand finish.
Perhaps aided by sparring with Mikkel Kessler prior to the contest, Groves put on a masterclass to quickly dispatch the respected Gonzalez, who entered the contest with just two defeats in 32 professional fights.
The final punch was a flush overhand right, a worthy blow to win any contest.
“It was something we’ve been working on in the gym,” Groves said afterwards. “I was looking to speed up my right hand because when it lands it always causes problems.
“I saw Gonzalez open and thought this was my opportunity ... and it must have landed right on the button.”
Gonzalez entered the contest with decent pedigree, with his only defeat in his last 17 fights coming against Adonis Stevenson - who is due to fight Chad Dawson for the WBC title next month.
The Uruguayan made the first move of the contest - appearing to stun Groves with one of his first punches - but the Englishman quickly shrugged that off to take control of matters.
In the second, the Hammersmith-born fighter rocked his opponent with a strong right-hand - before his left took centre stage in the third, landing flush with more than one strike as Gonzalez appeared to be struggling to cope with the power of his unrelenting opponent.
Body shots seemed to be paying off for Groves as he dominated matters, moving his opponent around the ring before seemingly picking him off at will. Gonzalez was struggling to evade a pinpoint jab, failing to offer any sort of retort as Groves returned to his corner more than once without taking any damage.
It was not obvious that the finish was coming, but when it did it was suitably devastating. With 51 seconds gone in the fifth round Gonzalez opened his shoulders slightly - and that was the only invitation Groves needed, as a downward right-hand drove through the South American’s jaw, sending him to the canvas.
Getting to his feet on the five-count, the referee quickly decided Gonzalez was in no state to continue.
“Today I came out and controlled him from the start,” Groves concluded. “I traded a little bit recklessly when I didn’t need to ... but the shots were landing hard.
“It was about wearing him down. I knew he wasn’t going to be able to cope with them.”
Groves quickly targetted a world title shot in the aftermath - hinting that he would welcome a meeting with either of the night’s main event fighters, Carl Froch and Mikkel Kessler. (Readthe original story)

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Winonan’s love of boxing pushes him toward other goals

How does the phrase go? Find something you love doing, and you never work a day in your life?
Justus Pomeroy knows he’s found something he loves, and the work is turning out to be pretty enjoyable as well.
It has been seven years since Pomeroy discovered boxing, and the 19-year-old Winona resident has embraced it ever since.
“He had biked down to the Winona Lions Den Boxing Club, came back home and said he wanted to join boxing,” coach, mentor and grandfather Bill Pomeroy said.
“At the time he was in football, so I told him he’d have to wait until after football season was over because you can’t do two sports at one time.
“I had just figured he’d forget about it by the time football was over, but after football season, he went back and he joined the amateur boxing club.”
To join the Golden Gloves amateur boxing ranks, one must be at least 17 years old and have a minimum of 10 open bouts under his belt. Justus joined Golden Gloves at the age of 18, and with an overall record of 11-7, earned the Upper Midwest welterweight division championship on April 27 with a three-round decision over Saint Paul’s Maurice Fuller at Cass Lake, Minn.
The next step was the National Golden Gloves competition on May 13 in Salt Lake City, Utah, but Justus’ back, which has a tendency to flare up from time-to-time, began giving him problems.
“I believe it came from playing football,” Justus Pomeroy said. “The doctors said they didn’t see anything medically wrong with it, but the physical therapist said it’s a product of bad posture and not working my back out enough when I was younger. I do a lot more back and shoulder work to help it out, but every once in a while it flares up.”
The national Golden Gloves competition would have to wait.
“I was crushed, absolutely crushed. I don’t really leave the state much, so to get to meet people at nationals like coaches, fans and other boxers would have been a whole different environment that would be an awesome thing to be around,” Justus Pomeroy said.
That momentary disappointment did not blind Pomeroy from his ultimate goal.
Muhammad Ali once said, “I hated every minute of training, but I said, ‘Don’t quit. Suffer now and live the rest of your life as a champion.’”
Pomeroy, on the other hand, loves to train.
Be it sprints, cardio, shadow boxing, working the heavy bag, crunches, push-ups or lunges, Pomeroy pushes himself hour after hour.
“You’ve got to have a lot of determination,” Pomeroy said. “You get those days when you don’t want to go to the gym, but I’ve noticed at the gym that I’m kind of a role model for some of the younger guys.”
And though Pomeroy aspires to continue boxing, it is training and mentoring that he plans to turn into a career.
Pomeroy plans to attend either the Southeast Technical College or Winona State this fall to study anatomy and physiology with a goal of becoming a physical trainer.
“I love creating workouts, it’s one of my hobbies,” Pomeroy said. “It would be fun to give workouts to other people and help them grow.”
Combine the determination of a boxer with a passion for training and you don’t get far unless you have a plan, and that, too, plays right into Pomeroy’s hand.
“Working out is like eating,” Pomeroy said. “You go in and see all that good food, and your eyes are bigger than your stomach.
“You’ve got all these plans, but if you don’t write them down your eyes are bigger than your stomach, then you get halfway done and you’re like, ‘Oh, I’m full,’” Pomeroy said.
So Pomeroy documents his plans, even to the point where checklists play a small role in his perfectionism. Having worked as a delivery man for Erberts & Gerberts, he noted that it was “not the hardest job ever,” but that knowing the streets was a must.
Pomeroy found himself driving around town to see if he could remember the names of the streets.
“Little things like that stick with you from boxing,” Pomeroy said. “I’ve noticed at the gym that I’m kind of a role model for some of the younger guys. I want to transfer that over to being a trainer. I’ve been told to aim high and keep your goals in front of you so you have something to strive for.” (Read the original story)

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UFC leaving boxing behind

Side by side on a couch were Dana White and Mike Tyson, a pair of lifelong boxing fans, explaining why they rarely get excited to watch boxing anymore. That’s how times change.
In the mid-1980s and even until his final, forgettable fight in 2005, Tyson made boxing a legitimate heavyweight sport. When he stepped into the ring, we all watched.
“When Tyson fights happened, man, I wouldn’t go anywhere,” White said. “You were watching that thing and you were staying home because crazy (expletive) was going to happen. And that’s part of the whole appeal of it.
“If I put down my 60 bucks and I’m sitting there, I want my Holy (expletive) moment when I jump out of my seat and go, ‘Holy (expletive), that just (expletive) happened,’ and you’re high-fiving with all your buddies. That’s why you pay your money, and that’s why you watch the fights.”
In the middle of that animated speech, White actually did jump off the couch, knocking my tape recorder to the floor. He sat back down and said, “And you just don’t get that anymore with boxing. This younger generation, they’re not watching boxing.”
The younger generation, and the middle-aged crowd, prefers the Ultimate Fighting Championship, for many reasons.
Start at the top with White, the UFC president and the coolest “commissioner” in all of sports. Bud Selig and David Stern are good in their own ways for baseball and the NBA, respectively, and Roger Goodell is a semi-hip leader for the NFL.
White is different, in the best way possible, because he’s as enthusiastic about his sport as the rowdy fans who filled the MGM Grand Garden for UFC 160 on Saturday night.
“I’m still a huge boxing fan,” White said, detailing how boxing “fell apart at the amateur level” and started to fade once Tyson disappeared and turned the heavyweight division over to stiffs like the Klitschko brothers.
Boxing was left mostly in the hands of Oscar De La Hoya, Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao — all great fighters, but none heavyweights, and heavyweights drive the popularity of fighting.
There were 12 fights on the UFC 160 card, and I’ll say nine were highly entertaining. The heavyweights at the top of the main card put on a show.
Junior dos Santos dropped Mark Hunt, a 265-pounder with a cement block for a head and bricks attached to his wrists, with an overhand right in the first round and finished him with a spinning heel kick in the third round.
In the heavyweight championship bout, Cain Velasquez, who closed as a 9-1 favorite, pounded Antonio “Bigfoot” Silva in 81 seconds. If there’s a downside to some UFC fights, it’s that they can be too brief. There are more knockouts, and no sleepy 12-round pillow fights.
I’m a boxing fan, too, but a far less interested one in recent years. I covered the De La Hoya-Mayweather fight in May 2007. The atmosphere in the Grand Garden was electric that night — as it is for most big boxing events — but the fight came nowhere close to equaling the hype.
The Mayweather-Robert Guerrero fight early this month was more of the same, an uneventful and unanimous 12-round decision for Mayweather.
“I don’t want to sound like I’m dogging on Floyd,” White said. “But I came to the fight, I paid for my ticket, I came here, and I wish I didn’t drive to the arena. I should have just watched it at home.”
Tyson interjected, “It’s like watching paint dry.”
White continued, “De La Hoya fought his ass off and was in some good fights with some big guys. You knew when De La Hoya was in town, it was big, and there’s just nothing like that anymore.”
The UFC is better than boxing, and it has been for about a decade, in part because of the quality and volume of fights in the cage. The top fighters don’t dodge each other to protect their record, many of the battles are downright brutal, and the undercards are good enough to make fans show up early.
It’s better in more subtle ways, too. The UFC is superior with marketing, putting more events on free TV. When superstars Chuck Liddell, Randy Couture and Tito Ortiz retired, White had groomed enough big-name fighters to take their place.
Even the octagon girls, Arianny Celeste and Brittney Palmer, are marketed as stars, appearing on Maxim magazine and Playboy covers. In boxing, the ring girls are anonymous. UFC fans argue over Celeste and Palmer like we used to debate Ginger vs. Mary Ann.
White explains it best, saying, “We have a full card on FX that reaches 100 million homes, and it’s being aired in 147 countries in 23 different languages, this undercard is, not including the pay per view. So that many people are tuning in to watch these new up-and-coming guys. We’re building all these different guys.
“Boxing has been the sport that has been dying for the last 20 years. They are still pulling big pay-per-view numbers and still pulling big gates for the fights that happen every once in a while. There are a couple guys out there who make money. Right now, boxing is in a place where you need a star, you need a really big star.
“Nobody could ever promote Mayweather better than he promotes himself. Floyd is so good that he’s so much better than everybody else, and his defense is amazing. So when you’ve got a guy who has awesome defense and doesn’t like to get hit, it doesn’t make for a very exciting fight. You can appreciate his skill, but it’s not one of those fights you’re going to go to like a Tyson fight. Go anywhere on Earth and ask if they know who Mike Tyson is, and people know Mike Tyson on (expletive) Mars. We are intrigued and fascinated by who the toughest guys are in the world.”
Tyson jumped into the cage Saturday to congratulate Glover Teixeira, and the crowd roared. We still appreciate boxing, but its best days are in the past.
White has set up the UFC, which is bigger around the world than the NFL, to own the present and future. (Read the original story)

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