By Jhonny Gonzalez
Unbeaten Saul "Canelo" Alvarez is not worried about the recently filed lawsuit by promoter Felix 'Tutico' Zabala of All Star Boxing. Zabala filed suit in Florida on Wednesday against Golden Boy Promotions. He claims to have a valid promotional contract over Canelo and further claims Golden Boy had knowledge of the contract and still signed Canelo to their company.
Canelo claims that he signed a document for Zabala to help him obtain a work visa but he never signed a promotional agreement.
"I think they want to seize the moment. I am calm because the truth always comes out and God puts everyone in place, and theirs (All Star) will be bad because they have been very bad. We signed for them to get me a work visa, but never to fight with them. It's a lie, and they have no grounds to sue," Canelo told Sal Rodriguez.
Zabala is confident that he has a valid four year contract, which starts in 2008.
"Oscar De La Hoya [president of Golden Boy] thinks that he can just ride right over the smaller people in this business, but he can't. We have rights and documents which indicate that Canelo had a contract that he had to honor with us. When my company, All Star Boxing, signed him, very few people knew who Canelo was. And we figured that we would start in Mexico first with the goal of making him a star in America. Golden Boy has acted in bad faith by trying to cast us aside. We are only asking for a legal way to recognize all of that effort," Zabala told George Ebro.
Zabala hired the law firm of Zarco, Einhorn, Salkowski & Brito, who previously won a case for Don King by preventing Ricardo Mayorga from fighting outside of his contract. They looked over Zabala's documents and see victory ahead.
"We have high chance of winning this case," said attorney Alex Brito. "Tuto has documents that make him the promoter of Alvarez and he is within his rights to be recognized as such."
