Canelo Alvarez has faced some incredible opponents during his career.
Alvarez may not have named Gennady Golovkin as the hardest hitter he’s faced but it’s rivalries like that which have helped turn him into one of the sport’s top stars.
There doesn’t appear to be any bad blood between him and Terence Crawford ahead of their huge super fight on September 13.
While Crawford has also shown that he thrives under the brightest lights, the same can be said for his next opponent and that’s exactly why this has been a dream matchup for so long.
Alvarez may not always have personal issues with his opponents but that certainly wasn’t the case when he faced off with an undefeated opponent in 2021 following a war of words.
Photo by Steve Marcus/Getty ImagesCanelo Alvarez set an attendance record when he stopped Billy Joe Saunders in 2021
Billy Joe Saunders had been a controversial figure in the boxing world for some time before he faced off with Canelo Alvarez in May of 2021.
The two men clearly didn’t like each other but that only made their meeting in the ring even more exciting, as the Brit put his undefeated record and WBO belt up against Alvarez’s WBA, WBC and The Ring super middleweight titles.
While the matchup was competitive, it came to an end in the eighth round when Saunders’ team threw in the towel due to an eye injury that he had suffered in the fight.
Even after producing an impressive win in what would end up being the last fight of Saunders’ career, Alvarez told Dan Canobbio in an interview for PPV.com that there was only one answer for the opponent that he has hated the most.
“Billy Joe Saunders. I think he’s a bad person, that’s why.”
Photo by Al Bello/Getty Images
As one of the biggest draws in the sport, the Mexican superstar is certainly no stranger to attracting huge amounts of interest for his fights.
This particular bout, hosted at the AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas saw Alvarez break the record for the largest indoor attendance for a boxing event in the United States at 73,126.
The previous record was set over 40 years before that in September of 1978, where Muhammad Ali avenged his prior loss to Leon Spinks with the final victory of his career at the Superdome in New Orleans.
Canelo Alvarez went on to make history in his next fight as well
After stopping Billy Joe Saunders to pick up the WBO super middleweight title, Canelo Alvarez then turned his attention to his last objective in the weight class.
He was booked later that year to face Caleb Plant in Nevada where his undisputed status would be on the line due to his opponent holding the IBF belt.
Alvarez went on to record another stoppage victory, putting the American away in the eleventh round to become the first fighter to achieve undisputed status at super middleweight.
Following a loss to Dmitry Bivol in his next outing, Alvarez has remained at super middleweight where he has won six consecutive fights.