Teddy Atlas is not shy in saying that Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez does not come close to topping the list of Mexico’s greatest ever boxers, and believes insisting that he is anywhere near is ‘blasphemous’.
Alvarez is a four-division world champion having claimed titles at super-welterweight, middleweight, super-middleweight and light-heavyweight.
He’s been a regular feature on pound-for-pound lists for sometime, but Atlas is a firm believer that he is overrated.
Speaking on Pro Box TV, the trainer turned analyst admitted that Canelo’s influence on the modern era of boxing has been legendary, but argued that his skills as a fighter are nowhere near those of the likes of Juan Manuel Marquez and Julio Cesar Chavez, as proven by his losses and controversial wins.
“There’s no doubt how influential he’s been, and that he has been the goose that laid the golden eggs, that he has brought massive numbers to the pay-per-view and that he has helped other fighters that were fighting him, like [Muhammad] Ali did back in the day, if you fight him you get paid more.”
“To put him at the top of the heap, of the great tradition of Mexican fighters, that is blasphemy. You lost twice Canelo, you lost twice to Triple G. First time, second time too, I don’t care what you say and then you probably lost to [Erislandy] Lara, and you got dominated by [Floyd] Mayweather and [Dmitry] Bivol. Do I have to go any further? That is four/five losses, if we are going to be really fair about this.”
The more recent successes of the 35-year-old make it easy to forget his loss to Floyd Mayweather back in 2013 when he was just 23-years-old.
He went on to have a famous trilogy against Gennadiy Golovkin, and the first two bouts were controversially scored as a draw and a win for the Mexican. His split decision win over Erislandy Lara in 2014 was questioned by some too, albeit on a much smaller scale than his two fights with ‘GGG.’
Canelo will seek to prove that he is still the ‘king of boxing’ this weekend, as he takes on Jermell Charlo in a defence of his four titles.