Canelo Alvarez and Gennadiy Golovkin locked frosty eyes after stepping on the scales for the third and maybe final time. Canelo Alvarez and Golovkin battled it out for the undisputed super middleweight belt on Friday in front of a cheery crowd outside T-Mobile Arena on The Strip. The bout will take place Saturday at 8 p.m. ET on DAZN PPV.
Following an unexpected loss to Dmitry Bivol in May when he competed for a 175-pound belt, Alvarez (57-2-2, 39 KOs) returns to 168 pounds, where he retains all four titles. The 32-year-old is ranked as the fifth-best fighter overall by ESPN.
Golovkin and Canelo Alvarez (42-1-1, 37 KOs) engaged in a contentious all-action battle in September 2017 that ended in a draw. After the bout, Golovkin was relentlessly convinced that he had prevailed.
Canelo Alvarez Weigh In For Super Middleweight Championship Fight:
Canelo Alvarez prevailed in the rematch by majority decision a year later, although the result was far from convincing. They’ll finally cross paths four years later, likely bringing an epic boxing trilogy to a close.
Regarding the undercard, Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez, the front-runner for Fighter of the Year, weighed 114.8 pounds before making his first junior bantamweight title defense. Israel Gonzalez, his rival, weighed 114.6 pounds.
With two stoppage wins over former world champions Carlos Cuadras and Srisaket Sor Rungvisai, the 22-year-old Rodriguez (16-0, 11 KOs) has had a breakout year. The most notable performance by Gonzalez (28-4-1, 11 KOs) is a brave loss to Roman Gonzalez in 2020, a future Hall of Famer.
Canelo Alvarez, enthusiastically applauded by a sizable group there for Mexico’s Independence Day weekend, stated that he wanted to win it in 12 rounds and he’ll be waiting for it from the first round. He added that he knows it won’t be easy, as his opponent is also a superb boxer.