Alvarez beats Cotto by unanimous decision

Entertainment and sports figures including JAY Z, Beyonce, Mark Wahlberg, Nicey Nash, Mario Lopez, Paulina Rubio, Kate del Castillo, Michael B. Jordan, Sammy Hagar, UFC Bantamweight Champion Holly Holm, Kelly Rowland, Charles Barkley, Erick Aybar, Angie Martinez and former and current fighters Evander Holyfield, Andre Ward, Zab Judah, were all in attendance to catch the excitement live in Las Vegas at the Mandalay Bay Events Center. The judges had spoken.

Alvarez won via a 12-round unanimous decision victory with the judges’ scorecards reflecting a one-sided affair; 118-110, 119-109 and 117-111 all for the Mexican.

The moment was significant in showing a distinct lack of bad blood in the long running Mexico-Puerto Rico boxing rivalry. “I’ll fight him right now”, said Alvarez, who was visibly elated with his win over Cotto. “But now its my era.”. Against an opponent who treated his every act of aggression with haughty disdain, and armed with little more than his jab and footwork, Cotto remained competitive.

Freddie has been extremely open with his disrespect towards Canelo, and the twenty-five-year-old is not the type to show much emotion or anger, but he clearly must be either annoyed or angered by Freddie’s constant jabs at him leading up to this fight. Alvarez is now 46-1-1, 32 KOs; Cotto drops to 40-5, 33 KOs. I know him. He’s a friend of mine.

Looking forward, the next comparable event in Saul Alvarez’s career might be a fight with seemingly unstoppable middleweight Gennady “GGG” Golovkin.

“I’m not afraid of any fighter”, Alvarez said through a translator. “I have always respected Miguel Angel Cotto”.

“I’m very proud to have people like them and more than trainers, they are my family”. I’ll fight anybody, anytime. If that happened, I guess that would make Golovkin the lineal champion. We knew going into this fight that it would be a hard journey, but I feel that I was the faster and stronger fighter tonight. Cotto was effective in the opening round using his jab, but Canelo did well countering in what was a close round.

De La Hoya subsequently revealed they had actually made it a “win-win” situation, telling TMZ.com, “We put $100,000 on the line, but it’s a win-win for everybody, because if my guy wins, then I donate to his charity, if his guy wins, he donates to my charity”. Words, after all, are mere wind-and at the post fight press conference Golden Boy chief Oscar De La Hoya immediately began to walk back Canelo’s fearless words in the ring. But Alvarez’s heavier blows seemed to inflict heavier damage than Cotto’s. Alvarez weighed exactly 155 the day before the fight, but after rehydrating appeared noticeably larger than the Puerto Rican star in the ring. Both fighters stood toe to toe, throwing wild punches, but missing several times. So this is just another fight where Canelo is getting better and better and better.

Canelo was expected to be the bigger puncher, and he was.

Nevertheless, a loss is a loss and it is now time to look on what’s next for both fighters. We called it. Right from the start, we said it was going to be a very hard, tough fight.

There is good reason to be optimistic about the Canelo-Golovkin idea, due to Alvarez’s past of taking fights that many thought he’d avoid, or be directed to avoid. Yet Alvarez’s power shots were crisp as he mixed in uppercuts and short right hands in close.

After such a tremendous fight and important night for the sport, that’s the least that everyone can do for Cotto and Canelo. LALATE reported the highest level of boxing news readership since MayPac 2015.