By Sean Crose
According to various reports, someone from Canelo Alvarez’ camp has claimed the Mexican superstar is being less than on the ball while training for his upcoming bout with Erislandy Lara. “It’s like Alvarez isn’t even in full training right now,” the “insider” is quoted as saying at the website Live Fight. He’s picking and choosing when to train, he’s sending sparing partners home…you can’t even approach him. He’s like a child of sixteen not a twenty-three year old man.
To make matters worse, the insider claims that Canelo weighs 168 pounds (or at least he did at the time of the insider’s revelations) And to put a cherry on the sundae – the insider also announced that Eddy and Jose Reynoso, who train Canelo, are, well, scared of the guy.
Naturally, none of this may be true. The insider is nameless, after all. Besides, who’s to say he or she isn’t someone who’s trying to get the Lara camp to take its foot off the pedal as fight time approaches? In other words, who’s to say this whole thing isn’t a ruse?
Then again, it would seem like a bit of a waste of time to try to psych out Lara. Ronnie Shields is a top notch trainer. If he’s heard this rumor – and he undoubtedly has – he’s surely told Lara to ignore it and to keep focused. Provided, he’s even needed to say as much to Lara. One would suspect the Cuban immigrant would know enough to take such news with a grain of salt without having to be told.
That leaves two far more likely scenarios to be the case. The first is that the insider isn’t much of an insider at all. Rather, he or she is more of a hanger on who possesses a melodramatic bent. He or she, simply put, has made a mountain out of a million small moll hills. And people like me have been more than happy to report on it.
The other scenario is that, lo and behold, this insider is telling the truth – and the great Canelo Alvarez is just not taking his upcoming fight seriously. That’s bad news – for the pay per view audience, for those who have purchased tickets for the MGM Grand and especially for Canelo himself.
For Erislandy Lara is an exceedingly skilled fighter. In fact, he’s reminiscent of Mayweather. That alone should be giving Canelo pause – or at the very least motivation to prepare to the best of his ability. More than a few sites are mentioning the possibility that the red headed kid from Guadalajara is acting like Julio Caesar Chavez Junior. Well, if that’s the case, then Canelo can expect to end up like Julio Caesar Chavez Junior. And why would he want that?
At any rate I personally hope this report isn’t true. I like that Canelo has agreed to meet a serious challenger. I’ve also found Canelo to be a total gentleman on the occasions where I’ve gotten to throw a question or two his way. In other words, I think he’s good for the sport of boxing in this age of flash and ducking.
Let’s hope he lives up to all the hype, if not talent-wise, then at least as a true competitor.
