By Rick Reeno
Golden Boy Promotions CEO Richard Schaefer has three potential options in mind for Mexican superstar Saul "Canelo" Alvarez (42-1-1, 30KOs). Canelo is scheduled to return, on Showtime Pay-Per-View, on March 8th at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. He also plans to fight on July 26th and November 2nd, with those two returns also landing on Showtime Pay-Per-View.
Canelo's last fight was a record-shattering twelve round decision loss to Floyd Mayweather Jr. on September 14th. The event generated 2.2 million pay-per-view purchases and $150 million in pay-per-view revenue.
Schaefer is going to meet with Canelo next week in San Antonio, where Golden Boy is going to stage a Showtime quadrupleheader from the Alamodome.
"I'm going to be seeing Canelo next week and we're going to talk about it in San Antonio. [Things will be clear next week] or the week after. I want to sit down with him, but obviously we don't want to wait. He is serious about fighting three times next year. He announced the dates and nobody is going to tell him differently," Schaefer told BoxingScene.com.
Canelo's desired opponent is former three division world champion Miguel Cotto (38-4, 31KOs), and Schaefer has already presented an offer of $10 million dollars to the Puerto Rican star. With the pay-per-view revenue, Schaefer says Cotto would stand to make considerably more.
"It's $10 million, plus the Puerto Rican [pay-per-view] rights, so it would be even more than the $10 million. We have to see what Miguel decides," Schaefer said.
But Cotto, according to sources in Puerto Rico, is leaning in the direction of facing WBC middleweight champion Sergio Martinez on June 7th at New York's Madison Square Garden. The theory, in part, is Cotto - win or lose against Martinez - will still have the option of facing Canelo on one of his two remaining pay-per-view dates.
If Cotto officially accepts a fight against Martinez, then Schaefer has three possibilities for Canelo. One of them is IBF junior middleweight champion Carlos Molina (22-5-2, 6KOs). Molina is a rough customer and usually avoided due to his awkward style and good chin.
Schaefer is keeping the other two options under wraps, for now, but admits the winner of Erislandy Lara vs. Austin Trout could become another option. Lara-Trout is part of Showtime's quadrupleheader this coming Saturday night at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. Between those two - Lara would be more probable, since Canelo defeated Trout by way of a twelve round decision in April of this year before 40,000 fans at the Alamodome.
"Yes, Carlos Molina is one. That's what I'm going to talk to him about. But there are two others that I have in mind, that I frankly want to discuss with [trainer/manager] Chepo [Reynoso] and Canelo first before I talk about them [publicly]. There are three names and then it's going to be up to them to tell me which of the three names. And each of those three names would be jumping on the opportunity and ready to go. The winner of this weekend's fight, with Lara and Trout, is another possibility. There are a lot of possibilities but I have to sit down and discuss it with Team Canelo first," Schaefer said.