By Rick Reeno

Las Vegas - As previously reported,  Golden Boy Promotions President Oscar De La Hoya was not a happy camper when he found out Tuesday morning that Miguel Cotto had dropped the WBC middleweight championship.

This coming Saturday night, De La Hoya's star fighter, Saul "Canelo" Alvarez, will face Cotto in the main event of an HBO Pay-Per-View card from the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino.

According to Cotto, there was a serious disagreement with World Boxing Council over the involved sanctioning fees.

Because of Cotto's decision, the title is now vacant and only at stake for Canelo (45-1-1, 32KOs). If Canelo wins on Saturday night, he will become the new WBC middleweight titleholder. If Cotto (40-4, 33KOs) wins, the belt will remain vacant and more than likely WBC interim-champion Gennady Golovkin will be elevated to the status of full champion.

"It's a disgrace. It's a disgrace to the promotion. It's a disgrace to the sport to do something like that. Every fighter dreams of fighting for the WBC middleweight championship and to do something like that is a disgrace. Look, I can assure of one thing - Canelo is ticked off about it," De La Hoya explained to BoxingScene.com.

Cotto explained that he was asked to pay $1.1 million by the WBC. They wanted $300,000 just for the sanctioning fee for Saturday night and an additional $800,000 as a step-aside free for mandatory challenger Gennady "GGG" Golovkin, who allowed the bout with Canelo to take place.

"Ask Oscar to give $1.1 million dollars to the WBC and then wait for an answer [from him," Cotto said. "It was $1.1 million dollars. Is that fair? No, it's not. The organization just create...they want four champions in every division just to earn the 3% of everybody. Then we have to pay for their mistakes. It's not fair to me."

"Yesterday I talked to [WBC President] Mauricio [Sulaiman]. He had our answer before our camp started [for the Canelo fight]. He waited until the last moment to put pressure on us. We call him yesterday - including the $800,000 dollars we have to pay to Golovkin just to step aside, I had agreed to pay them $125,000 more dollars, that was a reasonable number for me. He said that was not reasonable for them and he said 'no' and he said 'you are not going to be our champion anymore.'"

"I don't need belts. I have enough belts in my house and with $1.1 million dollars I can buy any belt I want and I can be the champion of whatever I want in my house. I don't need a title. This fight sells by itself and everybody knows what they can expect from Saul and what kind of fight they can expect from Miguel. I kill myself and train my ass off every day with Freddie in LA and I know that I have everything to beat Canelo."