That’s all for now. You can read a full fight report here.
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“Canelo beat me, he beat me at the distance. He is a very active fighter – he’s very good and he beat me,” Chavez Jr says, also through a translator. “I wanted to box but he went to the ropes and I just needed to throw more punches. I would’ve attacked more I would’ve been countered by his punches. Nacho told me to do that but the strategy didn’t work. The speed and the distance was the key. I didn’t feel that much power because I felt dwindled, I couldn’t throw as many punches as I wanted. My father kept telling me to throw more punches from the ringside.”
“Tonight I showed I could move, I could box, I showed as a fighter I can do all things,” Canelo says through a translator. “I thought I was going to showcase myself as a fighter that could throw punches, but he just wouldn’t do it. I’ve shown I can do lots of things in the ring, anything a fighter brings – I’ve shown I can showcase myself. I wanted to try something new, I never sit down in sparring and I didn’t want to sit here. GGG – you are next my friend. The fight is done. I’ve never feared anyone, since I was 16 fighting as a professional. When I was born, fear was gone. I never got my share of fear. I’m very happy, and the rivalry is going to show my skills even more. I’ve had difficult fights, and that will no doubt be a tough fight. But, I always say, Canelo Álvarez is the best because I fight the best.”
Here’s a look at the punch stats from tonight’s fight. Pretty much as one-sided as you’d imagine.
We’re told the deal for a fight between Canelo and GGG was signed last week. No venue has been determined. All that’s set is the date: 16 September.
“In September, they will see the greatest fight,” Canelo says of the upcoming showdown with Golovkin. “The era of Canelo is the best because I fought the best.”
Canelo Álvarez has just announced his next opponent will be Gennady Golovkin, who is making his way to the ring as we speak. This more than makes up for tonight’s whitewash.
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Canelo Álvarez wins by unanimous decision over Julio César Chávez Jr!
The official scores were 120-108, 120-108 and 120-108. A complete shutout.
Round 12
Canelo tries and tries but can’t finish Chávez, who ends the fight upright but not much else. We’ve scored it a complete shutout: the redhead won every second of every round from our seat. But we’ll wait on the official scorecards.
Guardian’s unofficial score: Álvarez 10-9 Chávez Jr (Álvarez 120-108 Chávez Jr)
Round 11
More of the same. A complete beatdown. Canelo just toying with him, Chávez just looking to extend it the distance, which at this point he’s one round from doing.
Guardian’s unofficial score: Álvarez 10-9 Chávez Jr (Álvarez 110-99 Chávez Jr)
Round 10
More of the same. Canelo just dominating. Landing big shots to the head and body. Crowd starting to boo even though Canelo is doing his best to finish the fight. Chávez is just a much bigger man whose head is apparently made of diamond. This is as complete a whitewash as I can remember on boxing’s highest stage since, well, probably the first 11 and a half rounds of Chávez’s fight with Sergio Martinez.
Guardian’s unofficial score: Álvarez 10-9 Chávez Jr (Álvarez 100-90 Chávez Jr)
Round 9
This is as one-sided as it gets. Canelo simply picking apart the bigger man. Chávez gets Canelo up against the ropes and throws a few punches but Canelo bursts back with a four-punch combo. How much longer will it last?
Guardian’s unofficial score: Álvarez 10-9 Chávez Jr (Álvarez 90-81 Chávez Jr)
This is just taking punishment which is leading to irreparable damage. Chavez doesnt deserve this
— Russ Anber (@RussAnber) May 7, 2017
Round 8
Chávez’s full eye nearly closed. He gets Canelo up against the ropes but can’t do anything of substance. More jbas and hooks from Canelo, who looks as fresh now as he did in the first. No one can doubt Chávez’s chin: even from a smaller man these are hard, hard shots. No real need to score this one any longer but for formality’s sake ...
Guardian’s unofficial score: Álvarez 10-9 Chávez Jr (Álvarez 80-72 Chávez Jr)
Round 7
More of the same. The highlight is a gorgeous five-punch combinaton off the ropes that peppers Chávez. This is a sad performance. No fear from Canelo of anything coming back. Target practice.
Guardian’s unofficial score: Álvarez 10-9 Chávez Jr (Álvarez 70-63 Chávez Jr)
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Round 6
Another one-sided round. Chávez doesn’t even appear to be fighting back. Purely in survival mode. Even when he has openings to throw punches, he can’t pull the trigger. He’s allowed Canelo to completely dictate the geometry of the fight and made no use of his length advantage. Another easy one for Canelo, who, it should be noted, hasn’t once sat down on his stool between rounds.
Guardian’s unofficial score: Álvarez 10-9 Chávez Jr (Álvarez 60-54 Chávez Jr)
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Round 5
Canelo is just walking Chávez down. A total mismatch. He moves Chávez backward with a weapons-grade overhand right, then closes the distance to keep Chávez in full retreat. He’s setting up his punches beautifully. Canelo is landing as many punches per round as Chávez is throwing, which is something.
Guardian’s unofficial score: Álvarez 10-9 Chávez Jr (Álvarez 50-45 Chávez Jr)
Round 4
Chávez simply too slow. This is getting ugly. He lands a right but Canelo walks right through it and snaps Chávez’s head back with another combination. Double jab, triple jab. Huge cheers from the crowd as Canelo chases the bigger man around the ring. Canelo loads up on on a right uppercut that missed by centimeters. Can’t see Chávez, even with massive size advantage, sticking around for the full 12 rounds at this rate.
Guardian’s unofficial score: Álvarez 10-9 Chávez Jr (Álvarez 40-36 Chávez Jr)
Round 3
Chávez took a seat between rounds while Canelo stood the whole time. Savage. Bell rings and Canelo continues where he left off: working off the jab to set up hooks to the body. Chávez not doing much to answer. A big right hand by Canelo. Fears that Chávez might come out even slower due to the weight cut appear founded: he’s struggling to mount anything resembling an offense. More head shots from Canelo and now a trickle of blood is running from Chávez’s nose. Another easy round to score for Canelo, who is dictating the fight through three rounds.
Guardian’s unofficial score: Álvarez 10-9 Chávez Jr (Álvarez 30-27 Chávez Jr)
Round 2
A good left-right combination to the body by Canelo. But now Chávez is stepping in and letting his hands go a bit, connecting with an uppercut as Canelo is pinned against the ropes. That’s Chávez’s best work of the fight so far but Canelo takes it well and returns in kind. Canelo’s advantage in hand speed has really been the difference here. An easy round for the Guadalajara man.
Guardian’s unofficial score: Álvarez 10-9 Chávez Jr (Álvarez 20-18 Chávez Jr)
Round 1
Chávez blocks a hard Canelo hook early, but both fighters are mostly cautious in the early going, circing one another amid loud cheers for both men. Chávez’s size advantage is very apparently, but he has a history of crouching and failing to use it to his full advantage. He mustn’t do that tonight. Canelo connects with a left jab. And another. Not too much action in the first but Canelo was busier and landed more.
Guardian’s unofficial score: Álvarez 10-9 Chávez Jr (Álvarez 10-9 Chávez Jr)
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It’s hard to overstate how loud it is in here as Michael Buffer makes the introductions. As close to a 50-50 crowd as you’ll find and each camp is firmly behind their man. Referee Kenny Bayless is giving the final instructions, the seconds are out and we’ll pick it up with round-by-round coverage from here!
Chávez is first into the ring, emerging into the arena to rapturous cheers. Now a lengthy video introduction for Canelo as hundreds of cell phones are trained toward the tunnel where the popular red-headed puncher is set to emerge. And there he is! He’s into the arena to México Lindo y Querido, his traditional ringwalk song.
Anthem time in Las Vegas. First Mexico, then the Star-Spangled Banner. Not much longer now.
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David Lemieux has just won a unanimous decision over Marcos Reyes. A lopsided one, as the ringside judges’ scores of 99-90, 99-90 and 98-91 would suggest. It’s just past 8pm in Las Vegas and the T-Mobile Arena is nearly filled to capacity as the pomp leading up to the main event is under way. The entire arena is singing along to Tragos Amargos.
Just a reminder that you can also follow tonight’s action in Spanish with our Luis Miguel Echegaray. David Lemieux is currently making Marcos Reyes’ face look like something out of a Lucio Fulci film in the ninth round of their scheduled 10-rounder, which means the main event should go off in about a half hour’s time.
How do you see tonight’s main event? At least one highly scientific poll shown below indicates a vast majority believe Canelo will win. That’s mostly in step with the odds at the MGM Grand sports book (more on that later).
#CaneloChavezJr goes off in the next hour. Your prediction?
— Bryan Armen Graham (@BryanAGraham) May 7, 2017
So uniform is the general thinking that some don’t even see the point of a fight that’s been call a sideshow in some corners.
@BryanAGraham Canelo easy. Pointless fight but media trying to hype it.
— think (@thinkkaz) May 7, 2017
There’s no shortage of political overtones around tonight’s main event. Take this TV advert, which depicts Álvarez and Chávez Jr running from Mexico and bursting through a border wall before ending up in Las Vegas.
“The idea of a wall was a direct hit to Donald Trump,” De La Hoya told the New York Times’ Maggie Haberman earlier this month, “obviously, given what’s taking place, and given the comments that Trump has made had really impacted many people and have rubbed many people the wrong way.
“This is letting him know that not every Mexican is what he’s stated they are. Mexicans are hard workers.”
Both fighters addressed the political underpinnings of the fight this week through interpreters.
Said Álvarez: “The thing about this wall is to show the people that we need to be united. United for every cause, supporting each other for every cause. That is the message.”
Added Chávez: “In Mexico, this could be important because this could be the making of an idol who everybody could follow. And here in the United States, it’s also important because of what people are going through politically in this country right now with the Mexican people. This is significant.”
Undercard results
Lucas Matthysse has just knocked out Emmanuel Taylor in the fifth round. The 34-year-old Argentine had been out of action since a knockout loss to Viktor Postol in October 2015, but he’s showed he still has something left in the tank in his welterweight debut. He suffered a cut over his right eye in the third, but managed to floor Taylor in the round. Then he dropped the American once more in the fifth, after which referee Jay Nady waved off the action.
That leaves only a scheduled 10-round middleweight fight between David Lemieux and Marcos Reyes before the main event. Here’s a look at tonight’s complete undercard results (so far).
- Lucas Matthysse KO 5 Emmanuel Taylor (welterweights)
- Joseph Diaz UD 10 Manuel “Tino” Avila (featherweights)
- Ryan Garcia TKO 2 Tyrone Luckey (lightweights)
- Marlen Esparza UD 4 Samantha Salazar (female flyweights)
- Raul Curiel MD 4 Jesus Sanchez (junior middleweights)
- Ronny Rios TKO 4 Daniel Noriega (junior featherweights)
- Joseph Aguirre UD 6 Angel Aispuro (lightweights)
Preamble
Hello and welcome to the Las Vegas Strip for tonight’s all-Mexican showdown between Canelo Álvarez and Julio César Chávez Jr. This one is more of an event than a fight, but as a celebration of Cinco de Mayo you could hardly do better than a matchup of two of Mexico’s most popular boxers.
Álvarez (50-2-1, 32 KOs) is coming off a ninth-round stoppage of Liam Smith to capture the WBO light middleweight championship. The 26-year-old from Guadalajara had previously defeated Miguel Cotto for the WBC middleweight title, defending it once this time last year with a sixth-round knockout of Amir Khan before vacating to move back down to 154lbs.
Chávez Jr (50-2-1, 32 KOs), the 31-year-son of the greatest fighter in Mexico’s rich boxing history, won the WBC’s version of the middleweight title in 2011 and defended it three times before losing it to Sergio Martínez in 2012. He’s had just five fights in the four years since, strugging with making weight in those outings. He ended a 17-month layoff in December with a unanimous-decision win over someone named Dominik Britsch.
Tonight’s scheduled 12-round fight was contracted at a catch-weight of 164½lbs. Both fighters made weight at Friday’s weigh-in, each coming in a 164lbs on the nose.
Plenty more to come from Las Vegas. In the meantime, enjoy this beer commercial featuring Canelo and Sylvester Stallone.
Bryan will be here shortly.
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