Canelo Alvarez is in a no-win situation if he gives up a guaranteed windfall.
If the Mexican star defeats Gennadiy Golovkin in his third fight on Saturday in Las Vegas, critics will say he beat a 40-year-old fighter past his prime and moving up in weight for the fight. If he loses, it will be against that old man and it will be his second straight loss after a one-sided loss to Dmitry Bivol in May.
In other words, a win wouldn’t have much of an impact on Alvarez’s legacy given Golovkin’s current limitations; a loss could significantly damage it.
What is the silver lining for Alvarez?
Of course, you probably don’t have much to worry about. He is a heavy favorite to win the third fight against his rival, around 4½-1, after a controversial draw in 2017 and a majority decision victory the following year.
If he raises his hand on Saturday, he will have bounced back from the loss to Bivol and can finally put his checkered history with Golovkin behind him. Then he could focus on starting new rivalries, which is what he would like.
However, a potential disaster lurks ominously around the corner of Las Vegas Boulevard and Tropicana Avenue in Las Vegas, the site of the T-Mobile Arena.
Golovkin is no longer what he used to be, but he cannot be dismissed entirely, as some seem to be doing. After all, he has only lost once in his 16-year professional career. And he’s still an elite fighter if you count his middleweight titles and four wins after the second fight with Álvarez.
If Triple-G can pull off the upset, it would leave the 32-year-old Alvarez in a horrible and unknown position.
Just four months ago he was No. 1 on most pound-for-pound lists, No. 2 on Boxing Junkie. And he hadn’t experienced a loss since a far superior Floyd Mayweather gave him a full boxing lesson in 2013, when Alvarez was 23 years old.
After that, he seemed almost unbeatable, scoring a string of impressive victories over elite opponents to build a Hall of Fame career and climb to the top of the sport. And he was as hot as ever last year, when he knocked out Billy Joe Saunders and Caleb Plant to become the undisputed 168-pound champion.
Then came a dose of reality that proved Alvarez was human after all.
Nobody was surprised that he made the decision to challenge the talented Bivol, a light heavyweight champion. Alvarez had already beaten an elite 175-pound boxer, Sergey Kovalev. And obviously a fighter in his prime who had brought up the idea of fighting Oleksandr Usyk had begun to think that he was invincible.
Bivol proved otherwise, outpointing Álvarez to win a unanimous decision that was more one-sided than the official scores indicated (115-113 on all three scorecards).
Alvarez was undoubtedly humbled. And there were consequences. He fell off every credible pound-for-pound list and lost at least a degree of respect from those who had come to revere him as the best of his generation.
So what if he loses again on Saturday?
We may have to look at it another way. This would not be a major fighter losing fights to the all-time greats like Manny Pacquiao vs. Juan Manuel Marquez and Mayweather. Alvarez is supposed to be near the peak of his abilities. And he will have lost to a good but little-known 175-pounder and his faded rival.
Imagine Alvarez off the pound-for-pound charts entirely. That’s what we could be looking at if Triple-G pulls off a miracle.
Again, that probably won’t happen. Alvarez has every advantage going into the fight, which could result in the Golvokin loss that many are hoping to see.
However, you never know. Crazy things happen in boxing all the time.
