Gabe Rosado is picking Canelo Alvarez to unseat unbeaten WBA light heavyweight Dmitry Bivol on May 7th in their fight at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
Rosado believes the experience of Canelo (57-1-2, 39 KOs) against top-level opposition during his 17-year professional career will prove to be too much for the 31-year-old Bivol.
The unknown in this fight is how Canelo will deal with the size advantage of Bivol, as he’s bigger and is used to carrying the weight.
Unless Canelo chooses to stay at the same size as he did to become the undisputed super middleweight champion in 2021, he will need to pack on weight.
In Canelo’s only previous experience at 175, he beat Sergey Kovalev by an 11th round knockout in 2019. Some boxing fans believe Kovalev didn’t even try to win, as he ran around the ring, throwing only jabs, and never attacked Canelo.
It was a strange fight to watch because Kovalev never showed any aggression and eventually was stopped. Suffice to say, Bivol won’t fight passively the way Kovalev did against Canelo, which should make it enjoyable.
“Canelo, I don’t think he gets the stoppage, but I think Canelo has got that,” said Gabe Rosado to Fight Hub TV in picking Alvarez to defeat WBA light heavyweight champion Dmitry Bivol on May 7th.
“Who knows? We’re going to see what Bivol brings to the table because it’ll be the first time that Bivol has fought a guy of that caliber,” said Rosado. “So he might rise to the occasion and show us a better fighter.”
Let’s hope that if the fight does go to the scorecards, we don’t have a controversial ending like we saw the last two times Canelo fought at the T-Mobile Arena against Gennady Golovkin in 2017 and 2018.
Both fights saw scores from the judges that didn’t match the contest inside the ring, and it left a bad taste in the fan’s mouths.
Bivol hasn’t mentioned having any issues with fighting Canelo at the T-Mobile, so perhaps he doesn’t fear being on the receiving end of a controversial decision the way Golovkin was on two occasions at that venue.
“No, no, he has a chance. He’s a champion, a big amateur pedigree, and it’s his weight; it’s not Canelo’s weight,” said Rosado about Bivol.
“The only time that Canelo fought in that weight class was when he fought a guy that was a little past his prime,” said Rosado about Canelo facing a washed 36-year-old Sergey Kovalev in 2019 for his WBO 175-lb title.
“He was still a great fighter in Kovalev, but I just think Canelo is in his zone right now, and he has the experience to his advantage. So, I favor Canelo winning the fight,” said Rosado.
