There's a disparity between the fight that I saw and the one I reconstructed from boxing articles which claim, like the HBO team, that Saul Alvarez vs. Alfonso Gomez was an even fight and a toughie for Canelo at the time of the stoppage, that was clearly premature, ending an unconvincing performance. I saw it differently. As soon as the 1st round knockdown appeared Canelo seemingly set back to sparring mode, practicing defensive moves and counters, and showing pretty good upper body & head movement (outside of straight punches which seem the hole in his defense). Still, he had most Gomez punches blocked, slipped or picked up and answered back with selective power shots. I gave Alfonso 2 rounds on workrate and found the meaningful punches favoring Alvarez in the rest, sure he was economical, but come on, he was fullly alert of what's going on, and when he wanted, he opened up and scored, that's how the fight ended. While the stoppage looked premature at the moment, 10 seconds later Gomez was still stumbling around and the ref had to help sit him down, I felt Alfonso's critique toward the 'hometown fighter' was little unjustified, he was about to get Baldomir'd and did not answer a dozen power shots. Here's what I think: Alvarez, understanding he's in control after the opener, wanted a counter-punching workout before turning on the heat, figured if he jumps all over Gomez he might get things done in mere minutes getting hit in the process, what's to learn from that? At just 20, rushed into a world title (Rhodes and Gomez are good challengers) he looked content to make live progress instead of a quick shoot-fest, maybe the experts didn't like it, but it was a part of a bigger plan: operation elite fighter - and Canelo understands that's a long road ahead. This was part of that. I give him a Solid B.
Gomez shouldn't have even been in the ring with him in the first place. A blown up, second rate welterweight fighting for a meaningless title. That's fair.
Gomez was coming from a few solid wins, he was OK for a 2nd rate contender. Now on to bigger and better things. Who should Canelo fight next? I think Carlos Molina would be a nice choice, he should have a win over Chavez Jr. and just beat Cintron, could've got the W vs. Lara too.
He could beat up Cintron, I guess. That makes sense given how Golden Boy matches him. Just someone real who fights at 154 would be nice. Wolak or Molina? Those guys aren't incredible risks to Canelo but are at least competitive guys.
I thought the same thing, even more so once I saw those wild uppercuts he was throwing.. Then all of a sudden pop pop pop with fast, crisp, hard shots.
Yeah, Wolak, Cintron, Molina, would be satisfied with either. To Canelo's credit Rhodes is not far behind Molina, but these three a bigger name Stateside. Not much else at the moment if you look around, maybe Angulo. We are talking about solid top10 LMWs.
The HBO crew made it look like he was getting stuck but all i saw was Canelo just standing and trying to counter. Fully agree with you.
Looked like Canelo has really worked on his defence. At the time I was surprised to see him take those rounds off. Either he realised he could step it up whenever he wanted, or he was a bit unsettled by Gomez wearing his cup so high and leaving little target for the body shots Canelo would have been hoping to unleash.
Canelo is a natural counterpuncher, he doesn't open up much in general, and this is the style he would normally fight against a guy aggressively coming after him throwing punches. He found it difficult to catch Gomez with counters because Gomez stayed low and used good upper body movement coming in on him, as well as leading with his jab so he wasn't coming in recklessly. For all his talent, Canelo has been feasting on guys that simply turtle up against him and/or are just way too small for him, and though Gomez was undersized against Alvarez himself, his length was basically even with him, so Canelo couldn't get away from the punches as easily, and unlike most of his opponents, Gomez came to fight.
