Middleweight world champion Canelo Alvarez claimed on Friday that he was unaware of the deal his promoter, Golden Boy Promotions, made with the IBF that ultimately cost him one of his 160-pound title belts.
“I’m very upset and ashamed with my fans, to be unfairly stripped of my belt by the IBF, but specially when I did not have the knowledge of the agreement that GBP match maker had signed,” Alvarez wrote Friday evening on social media.
Golden Boy’s head matchmaker is Robert Diaz, who was the point person for the company with the IBF on a deal under which Golden Boy and Lou DiBella, the promoter for Alvarez’s IBF mandatory challenger Sergiy Derevyanchenko, would either finalize a deal for the fight by this past Monday at 3 p.m. ET or Alvarez would be stripped of the title and Derevyanchenko would move on and fight for the vacant belt.
A purse bid had been scheduled but postponed because both camps told the IBF they needed a little more time to negotiate as well as to get streaming service DAZN, which has an exclusive deal with Alvarez, to approve Derevyanchenko as Alvarez’s fall opponent.
The IBF granted the extension and Golden Boy agreed to the Monday deadline. Even as the deadline approached and with Derevyanchenko having been approved by DAZN — with Alvarez, according to sources, due to take as much as a $5 million reduction on his $35 million license fee — Golden Boy and DiBella still did not have a deal.
The Derevyanchenko camp agreed to extend the deadline again until Thursday afternoon, and when no deal was made, the IBF followed through and stripped Alvarez of the title.
Golden Boy and DiBella had been far apart on money. According to multiple sources with knowledge of the discussions, Golden Boy’s last offer was $5.5 million to the Derevyanchenko side, which was seeking $7 million. Had the fight gone to a purse bid, Derevyanchenko would have been entitled to 35% of the winning bid.
Now Alvarez claims he had no idea that the deal Golden Boy and DiBella agreed to with the IBF would cost him his belt without there even being a purse bid. Golden Boy CEO Oscar De La Hoya lashed out at the IBF in a statement issued after Alvarez was stripped on Thursday, in which he threatened possible legal action, even though the IBF followed its rules.
De La Hoya did not respond to a request from ESPN for a comment on Alvarez’s assertion that he was not informed of the deal with the IBF. However, a Golden Boy spokesman provided ESPN with a statement from the company, although it did not address Alvarez’s comments.
“As Oscar said (on Thursday), we are very disappointed in the IBF’s actions and believe they have been totally unfair to Canelo since he won the title in May. We’ll have no further comment at this time,” Golden Boy’s statement said.
Eric Gomez, the president of Golden Boy, however, backed up Diaz with a post on social media Friday night.
“(Diaz) did nothing wrong,” Gomez wrote. “The IBF has been unfair to Canelo since he won the title in May. Oscar De La Hoya and I stand by Roberto 1000%.”
Alvarez (52-1-2, 35 KOs), 28, of Mexico, boxing’s biggest star and heading into the third fight of a five-year, 11-fight, $365 million deal with DAZN, won a unanimous decision against Daniel Jacobs in their May 4 unification fight. DAZN hoped for a third fight between Alvarez and former unified champion Gennady Golovkin this fall, but Alvarez did not want to make that fight next.
Now it is likely that Derevyanchenko (13-1, 10 KOs), who suffered his lone defeat by split decision to Jacobs for the vacant IBF belt in October, will face Golovkin (39-1-1, 35 KOs) for the once-again vacant IBF title on Oct. 5. Alvarez is due to return later in October and could wind up facing WBO titlist Demetrius Andrade (28-0, 17 KOs) to unify that belt with his WBA title.