Thursday May 2nd

Even the fighters sat at the top table of Thursday’s undercard press conference looked bored by what each of them was saying. Perhaps they were attempting to keep a straight face at the description of Mario Barrios-Fabian Andres Maidana as the “co-main event”. 

In 2024, when there is a fight involving Saul “Canelo” Alvarez, there isn’t a co-main event. There is the main event that’s sold on his status as the undisputed super-middleweight champion and the world’s highest-profile fighter, there’s some attention paid – as a consequence – to his opponent, and then there’s the undercard, no matter how strong.

The appeal that exists in Brandon Figueroa-Jessie Magdaleno and Eimantas Stanionis-Gabriel Maestre may be considerable, but in Las Vegas, ahead of the occasion of Cinco de Mayo weekend, Alvarez-Jaime Munguia is the only widely recognised fight in town.

Magdaleno made no desire to hide that he was looking at his phone while he was sat the the same top table. His opponent, Figueroa, similarly didn’t seem on message when he said: “There’s not a lot of action-packed fighters nowadays. That’s one of the reasons why boxing is not really interesting no more. A lot of people are looking somewhere else…”.

Some much-needed star power was regardless injected into the media center at The MGM Grand when Alvarez arrived, shortly after the departure of Munguia, for his final round of interviews. Representatives of Golden Boy Promotions were with Munguia but Oscar De La Hoya, presumably in an attempt to avoid questions related to Ryan Garcia’s reported failed drug test, was not among them.

After Alvarez, De La Hoya is the figure involved in Saturday’s promotion most capable of drawing to it the attention that would benefit all concerned, but after De La Hoya – more so than any other fighter; perhaps even Munguia – it is his one-time trainer Freddie Roach.

Roach is working with Munguia for their second fight together. His struggles with Parkinson’s disease have contributed to him being less mobile than he once was, but his reputation has helped to enhance Munguia’s profile. Perhaps more relevantly, those who spoke to him on Thursday will have recognised that not only does he retain the appreciation for the sport that defines him and that he showed so often at the height of his success with Manny Pacquiao, but that he also retains all of the same passion.

“[Alvarez] has very common combinations,” the 64-year-old told BoxingScene. “He’ll throw a left hook to the body; a left hook to the head. Every time. Every time you get one, you get two. If he lands the one to the head I’m gonna kill my guy.”

Roach also briefly spoke about time spent in Manchester with Amir Khan, and asked if Khan is still living in Dubai. Before Munguia’s victory in January over John Ryder little thought was being given to him being Alvarez’s next opponent. His association with the great Roach may have helped him earn the biggest fight of his career; it also remains possible that Roach will oversee one last, seismic win.