Canelo Alvarez Cancels Dec. 6 Bout vs. Joshua Clottey Due to Ankle Injury

Those hoping to see Canelo Alvarez return to HBO on Dec. 6 will certainly be disappointed with the latest news out of his camp. Kevin Iole of Yahoo Sports had an unfortunate update regarding Alvarez’s ankle injury:

The fight was scheduled to take place against Joshua Clottey in Houston, but that will no longer be the case with this latest setback.

Golden Boy president Oscar De La Hoya told Iola and Yahoo Sports that Alvarez actually suffered this ankle injury before his July 12 fight. Alvarez still managed to win that fight against Erislandy Lara in Las Vegas.

John Locher/Associated Press

De La Hoya also reportedly said that the Clottey fight will likely not be rescheduled.

Alvarez aggravated the lingering injury while he was working out, and De La Hoya commented on it, via Iole:

"

It bothers him so much when he runs, or when he's up on his toes and hitting the bag. I think it's like a muscle strain in his ankle, is what you might call it. It's nothing serious, but the pain is serious enough now that he didn't want to go through with a training camp and then this fight. He wanted to get it fixed.

He went through the Lara fight with it and he didn't want to go through that again. He knows 2015 is going to be a huge year and he told me he wanted to be in tip-top shape.

"

Alvarez will be taken to a specialist to assess how bad the injury actually is, although it was deemed a strain in the Yahoo Sports report.

This setback comes after some talk that Alvarez will face off against WBC middleweight champion Miguel Cotto in May in what would be an absolute showcase event. Ideally, Alvarez would be fully healthy for that bout, otherwise his chances would be greatly diminished.

De La Hoya did acknowledge that Alvarez has his sights on a megafight in the spring, so it makes sense that the fighter would take care of the injury now instead of later. With such an important year on the docket, Alvarez’s health will be something to watch moving forward.