By Keith Idec

NEW YORK – Daniel Jacobs has put people on notice.

He can’t control how judges actually will score his fight against Canelo Alvarez on May 4 in Las Vegas. The cerebral middleweight champion just wants everyone that’s supposed to keep an eye on the process of selecting judges and how they score their scheduled 12-round, 160-pound middleweight title unification fight to treat him fairly.

Jacobs and his handlers believe Alvarez’s controversial draw with Gennady Golovkin and his subsequent majority-decision victory over the former champion at least give him the right to ask for accountability among those with influence.

“I do feel like there’s gonna be a lot of pressure on the judges, and we’re gonna keep a note of that, so we keep everybody accountable,” Jacobs told a group of reporters last week while promoting their fight in Manhattan. “Because we’re going in there, we’re risking our lives and we’re fighting for everything, and we wanna make sure everyone does what they get paid to do. And not, well, you know I mean, because there are people who say people get paid under the table. That’s not what I mean. I mean keep people accountable for judging fights the way that they see it, and not based on influence from the crowd or influence from any other source.

“My job is to secure a dominant performance and make sure that there is no doubt. So whether that’s being the aggressor, being that boxer/aggressor, whether that’s knocking him out, whether that’s winning a close fight – he’s a talented guy. I’m gonna have to adjust. There’s gonna be some things that I might have to face in there, despite his disadvantages. But I’m looking forward to it all. This is an exciting time for me.”

A reporter reminded Jacobs that Floyd Mayweather won very convincingly over Alvarez in September 2013, yet one judge, the since-banished C.J. Ross, somehow scored that 12-round, 154-pound title fight a draw (114-114). The Nevada State Athletic Commission never assigned Ross to judge another bout, but Adalaide Byrd scored 10 of 12 rounds for Alvarez in his first fight against Golovkin (38-1-1, 34 KOs), who seemingly deserved at least a narrow win over the Mexican superstar.

“We’re not gonna have those same judges, I’m hoping,” Jacobs said. “We’re not gonna have the same judges. But like I said before, we’re gonna bring attention to the judges to make sure everybody’s accountable for it. And it’s not to make excuses, or not to put anything out there prior to [the fight]. But still, I have responsibility as a fighter, reporters have a responsibility as reporters, even though sometimes you guys don’t care about it – judges the same way. So everybody has a responsibility. Cool?”

Brooklyn’s Jacobs (35-2, 29 KOs), the IBF middleweight champion, and Alvarez (51-1-2, 35 KOs), the WBA/WBC champ, concluded their three-city press tour Monday in Los Angeles for their DAZN main event.

Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.