Miguel Cotto: Better than Ever?

It seems as though Miguel Cotto has been around forever. The Puerto Rican knockout artist has been holding world titles since 2003, and in the twelve years since he has remained a permanent feature of boxing's upper echelons.

But he's had his share of disappointments. A loss to Antonio Margarito in 2008 was followed by a loss to Manny Pacquiao in 2009 and a third loss to Floyd Mayweather in 2012. Respectable names, and Cotto never looked bad, he simply didn't look as good. After the fourth and most recent loss of his career, dropping a comfortable decision to the southpaw Austin Trout, Cotto knew he had to make a change. He contacted Freddie Roach, the man who had coached Manny Pacquiao as the Filipino handed Cotto the most decisive loss of the four.

After dispatching Delvin Rodriguez in three rounds, Cotto was booked against the great champion, Sergio Martinez. On paper, Martinez would appear to be the most dangerous opponent of Cotto's career. In addition to being a tremendous boxer, regularly ranked just behind the usual pairing of Pacquiao and Mayweather on pound-for-pound lists, Martinez was a legitimate middleweight and the size disparity was very apparent when the two faced off.

One of the best performances of Cotto's career followed, but questions about the near forty year old Martinez's condition and repeated knee injuries overshadowed the victory somewhat. A victory over Daniel Geale, and Cotto was set up for his match this weekend against Canelo Alvarez. Cotto has looked unarguably tremendous in his last two fights and his style has markedly changed under Freddie Roach. We can question his level of competition, but the adjustments are apparently thanks to Roach, whom Cotto calls the Scottie Pippen to his Michael Jordan.

The same coach isn't right for everybody. Each top coach has their own focuses, quirks, and favorites, and the relationship between coach and charge amplifies or muffles whatever effect the strategic and training adjustments would have had to begin with. But Cotto seems to be just Roach's sort of man. What Freddie Roach has done well in the past is to get the big punchers moving laterally and hiding their blows. Given that Cotto, even at his worst, had one of the most dangerous left hooks in the game, Roach was delivered some top quality clay to sculpt.

Roach seems to have reaffirmed in Cotto the importance of being a boxer-puncher, and not just a puncher. If you have a terrific punch as Cotto does, piling up points in well placed jabs and three punch bursts will often do more to facilitate the knockout than driving straight in and trying to get off all the punches at once.

The dismantling of the ailing Martinez was masterful. For Roach, who taught a one handed Manny Pacquiao to utilize his lead hook as a southpaw from scratch, training Cotto for Martinez had to be a familiar task. Getting that lead hook around the opponent's lead hand in a southpaw versus orthodox match up is the task, and if it lands it can be a killer. Cotto repeatedly stepped to the inside of Martinez's foot to shorten the path of the hook and catch the bigger man quicker.

Martinez's lead hand was ready at every move Cotto made after this, naturally. So Cotto sprinkled in the body jabs underneath it. The simple feint low, hook high was responsible for most of the telling blows in the bout.

But Cotto's thudding work to the body showed itself too, as Martinez was paralysed in front of the Puerta Rican banger the moment he tasted it.

Against Daniel Geale, an orthodox opponent, Cotto's set ups looked sharp. No attempts to overwhelm, no pounding on the guard, just movement and well picked punches. Again, Cotto was giving up some size but his mobility allowed him to stay almost completely untouched. He got in when he wanted to, flurried on his terms with his crisper, shorter punches, and got out again.

One of the movements which Cotto was using repeatedly was pivoting off behind his left shoulder. This was a favorite of Roberto Duran and it saved him a good deal of hassle when he went up in weight against man mountains like Iran Barkley. By pivoting off as the opponent steps in (usually to throw his right hand), the pivoting fighter can normally force his opponent to move both feet and reset his position before he can fire again.

If the pivoting fighter is caught on the way out and he has maintained good position, behind his lead shoulder or arm, he can normally roll the right hand off and know that he is instantly in position to throw back the right hand. As it worked out in this fight, Geale never got off a combination past the throwing of his right hand, because Cotto kept wheeling away.

Cotto made success with a shoveling left hook / uppercut to the gut which he tightened by stepping to a slight angle to his right. This 'straddling the lead leg' as both of his feet are either side of Geale's lead foot puts Cotto's left shoulder inside of Geale's right.

This same angle was the one which Henry Armstrong loved so much in the infight. Hammering Hank took down some of the best guys in weightclasses above his own just by sticking to them and pounding in a short left to their solar plexus, round after round.

And when Geale finally did get close enough to throw more than two punches in a row, he loaded up and Cotto beat him to the hook. That is the advantage of being a truly great hooker. Felix Trinidad, Joe Frazier, Miguel Cotto, and so on. If it comes down to a fire fight and you have a tight, sharp, hard, fast hook, you have an excellent chance of clocking the guy while he's busy thinking about punching.

There's some vocal folks in the "Cotto is on the way out" camp, and plenty in the "this is the best Cotto ever" camp. My rump hurts from the fence that I'm sitting on but what I've seen of Cotto in his last three bouts, I've thoroughly enjoyed. Against Saul 'Canelo' Alvarez, Cotto has a hefty task. A terrific combination puncher, a hard hitter, and in the prime of his athletic career, the twenty-five year old Mexican is a fan favorite for a reason.

The joke about Canelo is that he is the scariest fighter you've ever seen—on the heavy bag. When opponents stop or get stuck, the creativity flows forth as he'll double or triple up with either hand to head or body, inside and outside of the elbow, eventually finding something and sending his man to the mat. What Floyd Mayweather showed in Canelo in handing the youngster his first and only loss was that Canelo doesn't like working to find his target.

Throughout that bout Mayweather switched between surprising Canelo with aggression and a thudding jab, tying Canelo up whenever the young man thought it was time to start swinging, and breaking his combinations with slick counters before they could even get going. Cotto isn't the outfighting technician that Mayweather was, but you would have to think that the mobility he has shown in his last two fights is a good sign of having his priorities right.

Miguel Cotto and Saul 'Canelo' Alvarez meet this Saturday to decide the lineal middleweight champion of the world. Two of the most exciting men in the division, and a prospective match with Gennady Golovkin to follow for either means that this one is well worth your time.