Jim Lampley on Canelo Alvarez’s ‘Secret Weapon’: He Can’t Be Unsaddled

Saturday night, as I sat down in my T-Mobile Arena press seat to document the Saul “Canelo” Alvarez-Jaime Munguia undisputed super middleweight title fight next to my PPV.com live chat colleague Jim Lampley, I was astounded by the first story he told our chat participants.

Lampley, the former 30-year voice of HBO Boxing and an International Boxing Hall of Fame member, often blows me away with his instant, eloquent recall of the multitude of events he has witnessed during his glorious career.

This one took place far from a boxing ring, in an area not too far where I was raised in San Diego – the wondrous seaside community of Del Mar, to be specific.

Lampley himself resided in North San Diego County from 2007-2019, and sometime after Alvarez made his Las Vegas debut on a 2010 HBO card, Lampley learned that Alvarez had bought a home in the neighborhood.

Alvarez trained at a gym farther inland, a rented industrial space north of Scripps Ranch.

More than a decade later, here was a 33-year-old Alvarez positioned as the face of boxing, a four-division champion striving to reclaim his former pound-for-pound-king status and meeting a young lion, 27-year-old Jaime Munguia of Tijuana, Mexico.

All these years later, Alvarez had still never been knocked to the canvas.

Before I had typed only a few more lines than my welcome ahead of the first pay-per-view undercard bout, Lampley, 75, was well into this story to set the table for the night’s most compelling bout.

“For a few years, Canelo Alvarez and I were neighbors. … I had friends in the horseback-riding culture there who sometimes described to me that they saw him riding horseback in the mornings at the equestrian facility down the hill from my home,” Lampley wrote.

“Once, before a fight in Las Vegas, I asked [Alvarez] about it, and he acknowledged to me that he rode two hours a few days a week.”

“‘On non-boxing days?’ I asked. “He said, ‘No, I do both. A couple of hours on the horse before noon, then three and a half hours in the boxing gym in the afternoon.’”

Lampley wrote in the chat that he was stunned at the output, asking Alvarez, “Isn’t that exhausting?”

Alvarez responded back then, “No, it’s different muscles entirely. The riding is all leg muscles. The boxing is mostly upper body.”

Lampley wrote in the chat, “That was an oversimplification, of course, but I got the point. And he was still young then, not yet 30 years old.

“For several years, we were near each other, and every once in a while, I would bump into the senior member of his training team, Chepo Reynoso, in the grocery store. Sometimes, I would ask if Canelo was still riding most days, and the answer remained, ‘Yes, that’s his recreation, and he loves the horses.’

“In recent years, tracking Canelo’s career, I’ve become more and more impressed by his punch resistance. I can’t recall ever seeing him badly hurt, and it’s been impossible for even the best opponents to knock him off his feet. In boxing lingo, we call it his ‘chin,’ but I now realize that’s not the heart of the matter.

“Long, long ago, in Canelo’s first appearance on HBO, against Miguel Cotto’s brother, Jose, I described the only [time Alvarez was badly rocked by a punch, the] moment the ropes kept him up after a hard left hook. Since then, he’s been upright all the way.

“Sure, the chin matters. But Canelo’s legs matter even more.

“His balance is impregnable. His unique strength stems from countless hours of squeezing horses to urge them forward.

“Jaime Munguia can punch, but it will take cosmic power to unhorse Canelo. He’s been polishing a secret weapon for a long, long time.”

Sure enough, Lampley had brilliantly dissected what was about to transpire as the younger, taller, fiercely driven Munguia rushed Alvarez like those snorting beasts do inside the Tijuana bull rings near Munguia’s home.

Alvarez withstood the entire early attack and found his own openings, decking Munguia for the first time in his career with a beautiful fourth-round uppercut.

Alvarez proceeded to a victory by unanimous decision, claiming his record fourth successful defense as an undisputed super middleweight champion and positioning him for another seminal bout in the late summer or fall against the likes of unbeaten WBA mandatory challenger Edgar Berlanga, unbeaten former super middleweight champion David Benavidez, unbeaten light heavyweight champion Dmitry Bivol or unbeaten three-division champion Terence Crawford.

I spoke to Lampley by email Monday, and he told me this:

“I’m more convinced than ever it lies at the heart of his success,” Lampley said of Alvarez’s attention to leg strength.

“Does it mean he could withstand Benavidez? I don’t know. But I think it means he would have the best chance of anyone fighting at 168 or 175 [pounds].

“And this past Saturday, he again demonstrated his ability – perhaps unequaled – to deal with a hard puncher.”