On Saturday night at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, WBA light heavyweight champion Dmitry Bivol shocked the boxing world when he retained his world title with a unanimous decision over 5-1 favorite Saul “Canelo” Alvarez.
It was the second defeat of Canelo's career and his first loss since 2013 - when he was outboxed by Floyd Mayweather Jr.
Bivol, 31-years-old, improved his undefeated record to 20-0 with 11 knockouts. Canelo's record dropped down to 57-2 with two draws.
Canelo, who is still the undisputed world champion at super middleweight, has looked unbeatable in his recent fights.
He had fought at light heavyweight in 2019, stopping Sergey Kovalev in eleven rounds to capture the WBO title. He would vacate the title and drop down to 168 in the aftermath.
Unlike Kovalev, the younger Bivol is still in his prime and a superior fighter.
"I'm glad I proved myself, I'm the best in my division and I keep this belt," said Bivol. "He's a great champion, I respect him and all his team."
Bivol would state that Canelo was strong, but mainly hurt his arms - where the majority of Canelo's punches landed.
“He hurt my arm,” Bivol said. “I felt his power, you can see on my arm. He beat my arm up – but not my head. It's better. He had a good speed and power. Maybe his mistake was he threw only hard punches. After hard punches, he relaxed and tired.
"I was feeling great. This was the biggest fight of my career and I enjoyed this fight. When the people booed me, it gave me more energy."
All three judges scored the bout 115-113 for Bivol, but most observers had the Russian boxers further ahead.
Bivol's unexpected win may have derailed a planned trilogy fight between Canelo and Gennadiy Golovkin, which was targeted for September.
A lot of insiders overlooked the boxing ability of Bivol, with many already looking ahead to other potential opponents Canelo could face at super middleweight and light heavyweight.
“If you don’t believe in yourself, what you do, you achieve nothing,” Bivol said. “My team believed in me. And you all should believe in yourselves, and you’ll achieve what you want."
