Canelo Alvarez versus Daniel Jacobs is a good fight with little drama outside of the ring.

It is rare that we don’t have the monkey business and pro-wrestling antics around a major boxing match, but on May 4th from the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada, Canelo Alvarez and Daniel Jacobs, marquee middleweight unification bout, will be a fight based mostly around the in-ring talent, and not the outside aspects.

It is a fight based on skill and respect, and despite the pageantry in New York City, Mexico City, and Los Angles as part of the three-day press conference, little was said that caused blood to boil. In fact, both fighters showed respect to the other, a welcomed changed in this day and age.

For all that people say about Canelo Alvarez, he is a very mellow, stoic superstar, who one might not even know didn’t speak much English even if you attend the press conference as Canelo speaks sparingly. 

Jacobs, a two-time world champion and cancer survivor, who in his first bout back from defeating cancer, once walked out to Kanye West’s “Power”, which had great meaning to him on that evening holds truer now than ever. Jacobs, a star in the sport of boxing, has turned a knockout loss to Dmitry Pirog along with ridicule before and after the Gennady Golovkin fight that he barely lost, into a storybook career as he will finish this decade fighting biggest modern day boxing star in Canelo Alvarez and having two of the most iconic middleweight fights of his generation.

That being said, neither gave reporters a ton to work with, since they’re both stoic and choose words, like punches, throwing more verbal feints than overhand rights. 

“I know Jacobs is a tough opponent and it’s going to be work, but I’ve always believed to be the best you must beat the best. I love challenges. I want people to experience a good fight when they come watch my fights. I may lose, but my heart is a winning heart and I want to give the fans a spectacular finish and I’m going to put up a good fight.” said Alvarez in Los Angeles, when asked about Jacobs. 

To Canelo’s credit, he is building up possibly the best modern day resume of any fighter despite some major asterisks next to his name. Alvarez holds wins over Austin Trout, Erislandy Lara, Miguel Cotto, and Gennady Golovkin, but that being said his wins over Lara and Golovkin are very questionable, if not inaccurate beyond the officials ruling he won. Yet, we can’t punish him for that since he isn’t a judge, Alvarez has fought the best he could, and not lost outside of his lone defeat to Floyd Mayweather Jr., now he is looking to become an all-time great, which many question if he can or can’t become.

Jacobs presents a problem that Canelo hasn’t seen in full yet, foot speed plus hand speed. Lara presented aspects of this, but Lara tends to disengage when hard punches are coming back at him and not let go with punches enough to produce a high enough output to keep someone honest. Jacobs will work, but has fast feet along with fast hands and good power, meaning Canelo could be waiting for long periods in this bout, as a quick counterpunch could freeze him.

Conversely, Jacobs has yet to have an impressive performance since his Gennady Golovkin fight in 2017. Since that bout, Jacobs has fought under Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom Boxing and beaten Luis Arias, Maciej Sulecki and former sparring partner Sergiy Derevyanchenko, whom he won the IBF middleweight world title from last year via split decision. None of these fights, showed the complete package and skillset that Jacobs brought to the table against Golovkin and at times the sloppy aspects of Jacobs such as trading recklessly would appear, especially against Sulecki in a bout that was very competitive.

“I have the will and desire to go inside to go in that ring and be victorious and I see myself with my hand raised by the end of night. I know the odds are stacked against me and Canelo’s resume speaks for itself, but he’s never faced a tall, fast and big guy all at once and that’s what I’m going to give him. We’re going to give you what you’re looking for and the fans going to get a great fight come May 4.” said Jacobs in Los Angeles as he is well aware of the maginitude of the bout. 

Jacobs brings up a great point that he is the most talented, big fighter, Canelo has faced in terms of an all-around skillset from using distance to switching stances, fighting on the inside as well as size and strength. Up until now, the biggest fighter in terms of size Canelo fought was Gennady Golovkin. Canelo campaigned around a fictional 155 lbs catchweight class before fully moving up to the middleweight division to face Golovkin in 2017.

The narrative presented by television networks and by some boxing writers was Jacobs was far bigger than Golovkin, which may or may not be true, but adds a layer of intrigue to the bout. This narrative was essentially put to the forefront when Jacobs no-showed the IBF second-day morning weigh-in, in which the fighter has to be with in ten pounds of their weight the day prior to fight for the belt. We interviewed a member of team Jacobs, a few weeks ago about this – which you can watch below. 

That being said, Jacobs quite possibly could be the biggest fighter, Alvarez has ever faced in his professional career and despite a rehydration clause forcing Jacobs to weigh-in within ten pounds of Alvarez at sometime the day before, it is figured Jacobs will be the bigger man come fight night.

The other factor to this fight is DAZN, the upstart sports streaming service headed by former ESPN executive John Skipper, which is focusing upon the sport of boxing to build their brand and expand their library of content. Will the average Canelo Alvarez fan/consumer be able to navigate the DAZN app, find the DAZN app and use the DAZN app to watch the content? Keep in mind, ESPN is counter-programming them with boxing card put on by Top Rank Inc. at the same time, so expect angry tweets and confusion. The bout will also be available at some movie theaters via Fathom Events for those unwilling to join the app.

This is the first truly major DAZN fight that seems that it needs to be a success and with Anthony Joshua a month after on June 1st, DAZN would hope to create a lot of new consumers waiting and willing to watch new content monthly, somewhat like NetFlix, and not worry about the schedule just view it as an expenditure. The big test will be boxing fans ability to use technology to watch the bout.

For those that want to forgo using the DAZN app and would like to be at the event live tickets for Canelo vs. Jacobs are one sale now and are priced at $2,505, $1,505, $1,205, $805, $605, $405, $305, $205 and $105, not including applicable service charges and taxes. There will be a limit of 10 per person at the $2,505, $1,505, $1,205, $805, $605, $405, and $305 price levels with a limit of two (2) per person at the $205 and $105 price levels. To charge by phone with a major credit card, call 888-9-AXS-TIX (888-929-7849). Tickets also will be available for purchase at www.t-mobilearena.com or www.axs.com.