Canelo: I Accepted Loss To Bivol, It Hurt Me, But I Still Feel I’m The Best In Boxing

Canelo Alvarez has come close against Gennadiy Golovkin twice in heated contests, but he doesn’t have a loss to show for his record.

Many observers have argued that Golovkin beat Alvarez in their 2017 and 2018 fights, but Triple G had to settle for a split draw and majority decision loss, the only loss in his 16-year career.

Since then, Alvarez has followed paths that never led to Golovkin for the past four years, most recently in May in a losing effort against undefeated light heavyweight champion Dmitry Bivol.

Undisputed super middleweight champion Álvarez (57-2-2, 39 KO) and Golovkin (42-1-1, 37 KO) will finally settle their feud Saturday at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on DAZN pay-per -view .

“I still feel like I’m the best [fighter in boxing]. I go up and down in weight classes. Nobody does that,” Alvarez told BoxingScene.com and other reporters.

“Everyone is afraid of losing. When you seek greatness, you will inevitably have some stumbles. But that doesn’t mean it’s not the best yet. I am the best. I feel better. I am the undisputed champion of my weight division. Did I try something else? Of course. I feel proud. I feel good. Loss [to Bivol] hurt me, of course. Nobody wants to lose. But that’s life.”

If Alvarez and Golovkin’s earlier decisions were in question, the Bivol fight was not. Álvarez was bullied by the bigger Bivol en route to a unanimous decision loss. Bivol outscored Alvarez 152 to 84, with the Mexican star fading as the fight wore on.

“I don’t want to make excuses, but the team and I know what happened internally and why he was tired,” Álvarez explained. “When you look at the first five rounds, I beat him. But after that, I started to get tired. Many things happened. But again, no excuses. I lost, and that’s what I take. My time and opportunity will come again and it will be completely different. But I just don’t want to talk about what happened, if anything happened, and what might have happened. I take the loss for what it was. I lost and I accept it. And that is. You have to take it for what it is. A loss is what it is. You take it and move on.”

Four-division champion Alvarez will fight career middleweight Golovkin at 168 pounds. His first two fights took place at 160 pounds.

“I always say it: I feel better at 168 pounds. That’s my weight class,” Alvarez said. “If I fight Bivol again, I will fight him at 175 pounds because I don’t want any excuses.”

Manouk Akopyan is a sports journalist, writer and television reporter. He is also a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America and the MMA Journalists Association. He can be reached on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and YouTube at @ManoukAkopyan, by email at manouk[dot]collect[at]gmail.com or at www.ManoukAkopyan.com.