Terence Crawford’s reaction to Canelo Alvarez becoming a champion again was short enough to fit in one breath. As AKHi TV reports it, Crawford said: “Clap for him. Clap clap clap Canelo. Congrats.” In this AKHi breakdown, that slow clap is the whole story of the Christian Mbilli fight — because the Canelo who won in Riyadh did not win the way Canelo has always promised to win. He was not the bull. He was the matador.
The host’s verdict is precise, and it is not an attack on the performance. It was a good fight, he says, but it did not live up to the hype because it was not Mexican style — it was Ali style, on both ends and especially from Canelo, who moved like Ali, like Crawford, like Floyd Mayweather, like Sugar Ray Leonard, like Sweet Pea. Canelo nullified Mbilli with movement, outclassed him and put on a boxing clinic. The host says plainly that he respects the style and enjoyed it. What he does not respect is the hypocrisy: this is the same Canelo who complained for years that movers run from him, who said Crawford moving up divisions and moving was running — and then, the moment a come-forward puncher finally stood in front of him, Canelo moved. Crawford, the host notes, still sat in the pocket with him and beat him.
Mbilli, in the host’s telling, helped write that script. He boxed at Canelo’s range, threw long shots, and fought like a man who believed opening up would put him to sleep — and the late counters Canelo caught him with told him he was right to worry. He was content to go 12 rounds, and so, the host says, was Canelo, who perhaps could have chased a stoppage and chose the clinic instead. It did not help Mbilli that he told a champion who said he felt 26 years old again that he was not the same anymore. Those pre-fight words, the host argues, debunked themselves: Canelo looked better than he ever did at 168. Looking ahead, the host expects Hamzah Sheeraz next for Canelo and likes the fight for him stylistically — a tree Canelo can chop down.
Our take: the movement was always legal. The lectures were the problem. This fight week began with Mbilli questioning Canelo’s gloves and ended with Canelo answering a different question — whether he could win the way the men he criticised win. He could. Boxing fans should enjoy the irony and keep the receipt: the next time Canelo calls a mover a runner, Riyadh is the reply.
Video credit: AKHi TV.
