Canelo Alvarez is expected to finalize a deal soon to fight Miguel Cotto for the WBC middleweight championship this fall in what will be the second-most anticipated fight of the year, and should deliver significantly more action.
Alvarez is considered by many to be the heir apparent to Floyd Mayweather Jr. as boxing's biggest draw, but Bernard Hopkins, a partner of Oscar De La Hoya's in Golden Boy Promotions which promotes Alvarez, admitted Cotto will be an "extremely dangerous" challenge for Alvarez.
Thus far the knock on Alvarez is that he struggles with pure boxers; he was outclassed in 2013 by Floyd Mayweather Jr. and then won a narrow split decision over defense-first Cuban Erislandy Lara. Cotto is not on that level as a defensive fighter, but under the tutelage of Freddie Roach he has morphed into a master boxer-puncher with sound defense. Hopkins also respects Cotto's power, and believes Alvarez must show new phases of his development to win.
"Cotto is extremely dangerous head-up, first half of the fight, definitely first quarter of the fight. He's going to have to give him looks. Not necessarily run, but give him some in-and-out movement, left-to-right, letting his hands go and fighting the way Canelo likes to fight when it's time," Hopkins said.
Hopkins, like a good company man, did pick Alvarez to beat Cotto.
"I believe he will win but it will be a hard fight. It will test Canelo, whether he's that legitimate next star in boxing. This will be the fight that I think he'll get the chance to show he's not just a come forward guy. That he's not just a guy that when he reaches this level of competition that he now gets over that hump."
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