Eddie Hearn has worries about what Canelo Alvarez is going up against this Saturday night against WBA light heavyweight champion Dmitry Bivol in the main event on DAZN PPV.
While the casual boxing fans that have never seen Bivol (19-0, 13 KOs) fight before are viewing this as another Caleb Plant or Billy Joe Saunders level fodder opponent for Canelo, Hearn knows better.
He’s seen Bivol fight many times, and he knows what this guy can do to a fighter like Canelo if he’s firing on all eight cylinders.
The major question is whether we’ll see the Bivol that was at the top of his game when he defeated Joe Smith Jr, Sullivan Barrera, and Jean Pascal with ease or will we see the one that struggled against Craig Richards.
Canelo (57-1-2, 39 KOs) hasn’t lost a fight since his defeat at the hands of Floyd Mayweather Jr, and fans have grown accustomed to seeing him win every time out.
When you get fans that believe that a fighter is unbeatable, as many do with Canelo, it’s disappointing for them when they discover they’re only human.
If this is the Bivol that beat Joe Smith Jr, Canelo will only have a puncher’s chance of winning because there’s no way that he’ll outbox that version of the Russian fighter. Canelo is too small, too lacking in punch output, and too weak to score a knockout.
“This is a very, very tough fight because Dmitry Bivol is fresh,” said Eddie Hearn to Intu Boxing about Canelo Alvarez’s fight this Saturday night against Dmitry Bivol.
“He’s never been in trouble in a fight, he’s never been hurt in a fight, and he beat Joe Smith, the other world champion easy,” Hearn continued about Bivol.
Hearn has got to have mixed feelings about this fight, as he promotes both fighters and he obviously doesn’t want to see either win. But at the same time, there are huge fights ahead of Canelo against Gennadiy Golovkin, Jermall Charlo, Artur Beterbiev, David Benavidez, and potentially John Ryder, Joshua Buatsi, or Craig Richards.
“It’s a stroll in the park, and he’s [Dmitry Bivol] been waiting for an opportunity like this for a long time,” said Hearn. “Now, he’s going to get it, but he’s going to have to be a pound-for-pound great to beat Canelo Alvarez because this guy is so good.
“I saw him up there, and I said, ‘Are you ready?’ The look in his eyes, it’s as if to say, ‘Oh, yeah.’ He’s going to bring everything to Bivol, and it’s a brilliant fight, and it’s a tough one, one of the toughest of his career so far,” said Hearn.
