Who Will Canelo Fight Next? – Beterbiev? Bivol? Usyk?

By James Slater

So, who will Mexican superstar Canelo Alvarez fight next? Two surprising names have come up over the past few hours: Artur Beterbiev and Oleksandr Usyk.

Bob Arum, who spoke with Sky Sports, said he thinks the plan Canelo had of challenging WBC cruiserweight champ Ilunga Makabu will “have to be abandoned.”

This is due to the fact that Makabu will face his mandatory, Thabiso Mchunu next, in a rematch.

Canelo perhaps will not want to wait, and Arum says Canelo will instead target either Beterbiev (assuming the Russian powerhouse beats Marcus Browne this Friday) or Joe Smith Jr (assuming the WBO light-heavyweight champ beats Callum Johnson in his next fight).

“I know Canelo pretty well, since he was a young man,” Arum said. “He has expressed interest to me about fighting Beterbiev or Joe Smith.

“I would look forward to May or September, the two dates that Canelo likes to fight, that he would fight one of those light-heavyweights.”

Canelo Vs. Beterbiev would be a great fight, and a great event. Canelo would get maximum respect from, well, from everyone if he took on the most dangerous 175 pounder in the sport.

In fact, Canelo would get way more plaudits for taking on Beterbiev than he would have got for tackling Makabu, even though that fight would have seen Canelo go for yet another title at a higher weight.

But Canelo may still make the move to cruiserweight, and one hugely unlikely opponent had thrown his hat into the ring for such a fight: Oleksandr Usyk.

Usyk, who perhaps had his tongue in his cheek, said to Boxing Insider that he would drop back down to cruiserweight for a fight with Canelo.

“Yes, I can fight him at cruiserweight,” Usyk said of Canelo. “But with only one thing – I keep my belts at heavyweight. Then I go back to cruiserweight to fight him and then I come back to heavyweight.”

So is Usyk, the reigning WBA/IBF/WBO heavyweight champ, serious? Usyk also wants a massive fight with rival heavyweight champ Tyson Fury, and he has that rematch with Anthony Joshua to take care of (assuming AJ does not agree to take step-aside cash to allow Usyk to fight someone else).

A Canelo-Usyk fight would of course be enormous, but is it in actuality realistic at all? There sure is plenty of stuff for fight fans to talk about right now!

Who will Canelo fight next? Who will Usyk fight next?

Canelo would probably fight Makabu; and Usyk rumble Anthony Joshua again. Time will tell.