Canelo Alvarez has come a heck of a long way since his September 2013 decision loss to Floyd Mayweather Jr. The loss, one that could have proven devastating had the Mexican been made of less stern stuff (how many fine fighters have we seen winding up all but finished after tasting defeat for the very first time?), was a hard one to swallow, Canelo says, but he made up his mind very quickly: the loss would not stop him from reaching his goal.
Speaking with actor Eugenio Derbez, Canelo, 53-1-2(36) said he did not actually take the points defeat as a loss:
“I didn’t take it as a loss. I took it as an apprenticeship,” Canelo said. “I still didn’t have the experience to fight in those scenarios and it was a really boring fight. It hurt a lot that night. But the next day, I said to myself that this is not going to take anything away from my goal of being the best. In boxing, I’m the second Mexican in history who managed to become the best pound for pound (Julio Cesar Chavez being the other).”
It’s really a loss nobody talks much about these days, so removed from the majority decision loss to Mayweather (yes, that crazy score somehow handed in by C.J Ross is still baffling all these years later; Floyd so clearly winning the fight) is Canelo. Wins over top names like Erislandy Lara, Miguel Cotto, Gennady Golovkin, Danny Jacobs and Sergey Kovalev have pretty much made fans forget the Mayweather fight.
Now aged 30 and at his peak, fans await Canelo’s next fight. And maybe that third fight with Triple-G. How much has Canelo improved as a fighter since the first fight he had with Golovkin? How long can Canelo stay at the top of the pound-for-pound charts? Titles won at four weight classes, many, many $millions won, Canelo went on to replace Mayweather as the face of boxing.
Yeah, September 14, 2013 seems a long, long time ago now.
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