Canelo Alvarez – Caleb Plant Talks Collapse, Fight Appears “Dead;” For Now At Least

Just when we were led to believe Canelo Alvarez and Caleb Plant were on the verge of finalizing a deal for their planned September fight, the super-middleweight clash “appears dead” as of right now.

This is the word from Mike Coppinger’s almost always, you-can-take-it-to-the-bank sources. Coppinger tweeted minutes ago how “talks between Canelo Alvarez and Caleb Plant have broken off at the 11th hour over disagreements in the contract. Discussions could be revisited, but for now, the fight appears dead after a deal was on the verge of completion.”

So what now for both fighters? Canelo and Plant could possibly resume talks as Coppinger writes, but the fight doesn’t look likely for September.

It seems both men will move on, for now at least. Canelo, a superstar, will not struggle to find a big fight – perhaps another move up to light-heavyweight being the option he will take. But where does Plant go now?

The Canelo fight would have brought the IBF super-middleweight champ a career-high payday, yet for whatever reason or reasons, “Sweet Hands” was not happy with what was being offered to him. Has Plant priced himself out of the Canelo fight?

No doubt we will learn more over the coming days. It is disappointing for Canelo, seeing how his goal was to unify the 168-pound belts, and Plant’s title is the only one the Mexican star does not yet hold.

But for fight fans, it just might be that Canelo will take a bigger, better, more competitive fight (no disrespect to the unbeaten Plant, but did anyone out there really think he would upset Canelo in September?)

Maybe Canelo will fight Dmitry Bivol, or Artur Beterbiev, in an attempt to win a second belt at 175 pounds? Either fight, with either Russian, would be a significantly riskier fight for Canelo than the Plant fight would have been.

But from great risks come great rewards, and Canelo is fighting for his legacy as much as anything, maybe more than anything. While it would have looked impressive in the record books if Canelo has scooped up all the major belts at super-middleweight, a win over a Bivol or a Beterbiev would earn him some serious fan respect.

Is there, though, sufficient time for a Canelo-Bivol or Canelo-Beterbiev fight to be made by September? The plan was/is for Canelo to fight on Mexican Independence Day weekend, this being a key date for Alvarez.

Let’s hope either Bivol or Beterbiev, if they are in fact Canelo’s new targets, will be more agreeable at the negotiating table than Plant appears to have been.

For even if Plant does feel he was offered less money than he deserved, he has to realize how big a star Canelo is. And, if you truly believe you can beat Canelo, you take what you’re offered, you beat him, and then YOU call the shots.