To you, the hater, there's nothing at all wrong with Canelo-Ryder
Plus tons more random thoughts: undue AJ criticism; career-altering fights; welterweights down, featherweights up; ranking Saturday's competing cards; Roy Jones in good company for bad reasons
A note to Fight Freaks Unite readers: I created Fight Freaks Unite in January 2021 and eight months later it also became available for paid subscriptions for additional content — and as a way to help keep this newsletter going and for readers to support independent journalism. If you haven’t upgraded to a paid subscription please consider it. If you have already, I truly appreciate it! Also, consider a gift subscription for the Fight Freak in your life.
This is boxing so, of course, people complain. One topic ripe for complaining on social media is that undisputed super middleweight champion Canelo Alvarez, one of the sport’s best pound-for-pound fighters and its biggest star, will next defend against John Ryder on May 6.
To those moaning about the fight: Shut the hell up.
Is it the best, most anticipated fight of the year? No. But there is also nothing whatsoever wrong with it and there will likely be a sellout of crowd of some 50,000 on hand at Akron Stadium in Guadalajara, Mexico, Canelo’s hometown, and hundreds of thousands more watching via DAZN PPV.
There are many reasons why this fight is absolutely fine by me (and if you don’t like it you certainly are entitled to pass on buying the PPV).
Let me count the seven reasons why:
1. It’s a homecoming. Canelo’s return to fight in Mexico is long overdue — and much deserved — after having not boxed in his home country since 2011 and not in his hometown since 2010. Did anyone expect him to fight King Kong in that spot? He’s entitled to have this one on his terms.
2. Canelo is coming off left wrist surgery to repair a nagging injury he exacerbated in his September win over Gennadiy Golovkin in their trilogy fight. Doesn’t seem radical to want a little bit of a lesser fight to make sure everything is OK.
3. It’s not like he is facing Ryder at the expense of a mega fight fans are demanding. The reality is there is no true mega fight that he could have had this year for his usual May date, so should he just not fight?