Caleb Plant’s win over Trevor McCumby last weekend made him a good option for Canelo Alvarez’s next fight in May. Former IBF super middleweight champion Plant is the ideal opponent for Canelo to people interested.
Canelo has reached the point where he has few options left at 168 for marketable flights that the public is interested in watching. The talented fighters that could give Canelo problems, like Christian Mbilli and Osley’s Englishthey are not well known enough to attract PPV purchases from the US public. Those guys are arguably better fighters than Plant and probably knocked him out, but they don’t have his name recognition.
If Canelo stays at 168, he will need an opponent next May who can generate hype, talk trash, and get people interested. This is where Plant comes in.
Plant (23-2, 14 KOs) won the interim WBA super middleweight title with a ninth-round knockout of McCumby last Saturday at Canelo vs. Edgar Berlanga night in Las Vegas. This win for Plant puts him in position for a rematch with Canelo, who holds the WBA belt.
“I thought, ‘Nobody, nobody wants to see this,’ and then I saw how popular it was this weekend. I was like, ‘Oh, no, this can definitely happen,'” said Chris Algieri Inside boxing Live on Caleb Plant’s performance against Trevor McCumby last Saturday, making him a viable option for a rematch with Canelo Alvarez.
Plant’s fight against McCumby stole the show last weekend on the Canelo-Berlanga card at T-Mobile Arena. The way Plant rallied after being dropped and hurt by McCumby was impressive. Sure, it didn’t look good that Plant was going up against a fighter with a one-dimensional game like McCumby, but that’s the kind of fighter Plant is. He’s not the best at 168, but he makes his fights interesting.
“Canelo has arrived in an area where he will have a rematch with Plant and Munguia,” said Algieri. “It’s only a matter of time before one of these guys beats him. Caleb Plant looked so good over the weekend. I thought he beat Canelo; he wasn’t ready for that level of a guy. I think he learned a lot from that fight that led into the Benavidez fight.”
Plant has not improved since his 11th round loss to Canelo in November 2021. The shots that Canelo hurt Plant in that fight would have done the same thing to him if he had fought him last weekend. McCumby had Plant hurt but lacked the punch arsenal to finish. Canelo took advantage of Plant’s habit of leaning forward by locking him up with uppercuts and would likely have taken advantage of that same weakness in a rematch.
“If he was the same guy who fought Canelo, he would have been stopped by Benavidez because he was beaten late but hung in there. Against Canelo, he didn’t. It crumbled under the pressure. Since then, he seems to have learned a lot. Put that in a rematch with Canelo, and now Canelo is three years older. Canelo is going to lose one of these days. She is getting old. It shows,” said Algieri.
