Shocker: Canelo takes aim at cruiserweight title, Makabu fight approved by WBC

Crawford: from Pacquiao to Porter; Quick hits; Show and tell

Pound-for-pound king Canelo Alvarez, who has already won world titles in four weight divisions from junior middleweight to light heavyweight, is obsessed with boxing history and eyeing more of it.

Alvarez intends to go for a world title in a fifth weight class at cruiserweight, which would mean a two-division jump to the 200-pound weight class for the reigning undisputed super middleweight champion.

In a shocker on Tuesday, Eddy Reynoso, Alvarez’s manager and trainer, addressed the WBC convention that is going on this week in Mexico City and made a formal request that the organization approve Alvarez as the next challenger for WBC cruiserweight titleholder Ilunga Makabu.

Reynoso’s request drew gasps from those in attendance and even appeared to shock WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman, who was overseeing the session.

“I am here to ask the WBC for the next fight for Canelo and will look for the cruiserweight champion Makabu,” Reynoso said in Spanish while standing at the microphone and drawing the gasps. “That gives us the opportunity to look for a fight with the champion after we won the 168-pound titles.”

Reynoso added that they would like to have the fight in May or June.

Sulaiman said the WBC would consider the request, put a vote to his board and it was approved.

“The WBC has approved unanimously Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez to fight for the WBC cruiserweight championship of the world. Congratulations, Eddy,” Sulaiman said. “This is a very, very big surprise, unique, but I’m sure he will continue to make history. Congratulations.”

The request came just 10 days after Alvarez made boxing history by knocking out Caleb Plant in the 11th round on Nov. 6 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas to unify the four major super middleweight world titles and become the division’s first-ever undisputed champion.

Alvarez (57-1-2, 39 KOs), 31, of Mexico, fought Plant at 168 pounds. Boxing’s biggest star has fought as heavy as the 175-pound division when he knocked out Sergey Kovalev in the 11th round in November 2019 to win the WBO light heavyweight title before returning to the super middleweight division.

In a corresponding move to approving Alvarez’s shot against Makabu, the WBC also approved promoter Sampson Lewkowicz’s request to permit former two-time WBC super middleweight titlist David Benavidez (25-0, 22 KOs), 24, of Phoenix, to fight for the WBC interim title in his next bout against an opponent to be approved by the WBC, since Alvarez will not be defending the super middleweight title until at least the second half of next year if the Makabu fight is finalized. Benavidez loomed as a possible next opponent for Alvarez until the surprise request for him to fight for the cruiserweight title. Benavidez knocked out Kyrone Davis in the seventh round on Saturday night.

After Alvarez knocked out Plant, he said he wanted to take a break after having had four fights in 11 months and would return in May. He said he would not seriously discuss his plans with his team until January, and he has been on vacation with his wife this week in Paris.

Reynoso has previously talked abut how Alvarez has sparred with heavyweights and been successful, perhaps that being a reason he would support Alvarez’s pursuit of a cruiserweight title.

Whether a deal for Alvarez and Makabu, who is promoted by Don King, can be made remains to be seen but it would represent by far Makabu’s biggest fight and payday. Alvarez is a promotional and broadcast free agent after completing a one-fight deal with Al Haymon’s Premier Boxing Champions and Showtime PPV for the fight with Plant.

Makabu (28-2, 25 KOs), a 34-year-old southpaw with excellent power, who is from Congo and resides in South Africa, won the WBC cruiserweight title by unanimous decision against Michal Cieslak in January 2020 in Kinshasa, Congo, the same city where the famed “Rumble in the Jungle” between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman took place in 1974.

Makabu has made one defense, also in Kinshasa, via seventh-round knockout of Olanrewaju Durodola this past December. The WBC has previously said he needed to make a mandatory defense against Thabiso Mchunu and canceled an mid-October purse bid for the fight when King and Mchunu promoter German Titov said they had agreed to terms. But no specific for the bout, either a site or date, have been announced in the past month.

Crawford ups and downs

Terence Crawford has certainly experienced the ups and downs of the boxing business at the highest level.

At one point earlier this year, Crawford, long one of boxing’s elite pound-for-pound best, thought he had secured a deal to face legend Manny Pacquiao only to see it go by the wayside at the 11th hour and then have to deal with the disappointment of the fight falling through.

But a few months later Crawford was sky high, having finally secured the major fight he has wanted since moving up to the welterweight division in June 2018 when a deal was finalized for him to defend his WBO 147-pound title against former two-time titleholder Shawn Porter.

Crawford and longtime friend Porter will square off in one of the year’s most anticipated fights on Saturday (ESPN+ PPV, 9 p.m. ET, $69.99) at the Michelob ULTRA Arena at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas.

I wrote about the failure of the Pacquiao deal and making of the big fight with Porter for The Ring magazine website, RingTV.com. Please read that story here: https://www.ringtv.com/630571-crawford-leaves-behind-the-heartbreak-of-his-failed-fight-with-pacquiao-to-focus-on-porter/

Quick hits

Heavyweight Tony Yoka (11-0, 9 KOs), 29, who won the 2016 Olympic super heavyweight gold medal for France, will face former world title challenger and French countryman Carlos Takam (39-6-1, 28 KOs), 40, on Jan. 15 (ESPN+) in Paris, a source with knowledge of the details told Fight Freaks Unite. It figures to be a major fight in France. It will also serve a measuring stick for Yoka, who edged England’s Joe Joyce for the Olympic gold medal. An eventual pro rematch has been talked about since. Joyce stopped Takam in the sixth round of an otherwise competitive fight on July 24.

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The day after Probellum announced it has signed British, Commonwealth and European bantamweight champion Lee McGregor (11-0, 9 KOs), 24, of Scotland, to a promotional contract they made a further announcement Tuesday that they have entered into a co-promotional agreement with Matchroom Boxing and that McGregor will make his second European title defense on the Joseph Parker-Dereck Chisora II undercard on Dec. 18 (DAZN) at the AO Arena in Manchester, England. McGregor will face Narek Abgaryan (15-1, 6 KOs), 29, of Armenia. The fight replaces light heavyweight contender Joshua Buatsi’s bout against former title challenger Maxim Vlasov due a hand injury suffered by Buatsi.

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Junior lightweight contender O’Shaquie Foster (18-2, 11 KOs), 28, of Houston, has signed with Probellum after settling a lawsuit with former promoter Lou DiBella, who had sued Foster for breach of contract. Foster is coming off the most notable win of his career, a ninth-round knockout of former world title challenger Miguel “Mickey” Roman last November.

Show and tell

Wladimir Klitschko and older brother Vitali Klitschko forged legendary careers as heavyweight world champions. Vitali is already enshrined in the International Boxing Hall of Fame. Wladimir will be inducted in June. They both had dominating title reigns, many big fights, and cleaned out the division other than facing each other, which they always said they would never do because they are brothers, best friends and, more notably, promised their mother they would never fight each other. Wladimir was coming off winning the Olympic super heavyweight gold medal in Atlanta when he and Vitali turned pro on the same card on Nov. 16, 1996 — 25 years ago on Tuesday. Vitali knocked out Tony Bradham in the second round and then Wladimir knocked out Fabian Meza in the first round on a card headlined by then-WBO lightweight titlist Artur Grigorian in a defense against Marty Jakubowski. Here is an extremely scarce program from that card in my collection. It always ticked me off that the Klitschko brothers were not featured anywhere on the cover, but there is a nice section about them inside the program.

Alvarez photo: Esther Lin/Showtime

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