Canelo Alvarez has begun to slow down lately, with his last five wins coming by points victories, but it wasn’t so long ago that he produced one of the most devastating knockouts ever.
Canelo hasn’t scored a knockout win since 2021 when he defeated Caleb Plant in the eleventh round.
Since his loss to Dmitry Bivol in the fight after, Canelo has produced no knockouts, and has won his five most recent fights by unanimous decision.
This wasn’t always the case, as Canelo knocked out Sergey Kovalev, Liam Smith, and Billy Joe Saunders.
But there is one man Canelo knocked out in a far more brutal way than any other.
Canelo’s knockout over Amir Khan saw the Brit flattened after stinging right hand
In 2016, a year before the beginning of his controversial trilogy with Gennadiy Golovkin, who was one-upped by Chris Eubank Jr., Canelo fought Amir Khan.
Khan held wins over Chris Algieri, who Conor Benn retired, as well as Zab Judah, Paulie Malignaggi, and Marcos Maidana, who wore Floyd Mayweather’s tooth on a necklace.
Khan, who is now a Pakistani army captain, had never fought above 147 pounds when he agreed to face Canelo at 155. The jump was too much for Khan, was 31-3 at the time to Canelo’s 46-1-1.
The fight made it to the sixth round when Canelo produced a thunderous right hand that left Khan out on his feet before falling flat on his back, sprawled out on the canvas.
Amir Khan had an unsuccessful return after three-year layoff
Khan fought four more times after losing to Canelo before announcing his retirement.
He bounced back from the loss with a first-round knockout of 28-3 Phil Lo Greco and a unanimous decision over Samuel Vargas.
However he was then thrown into the ring with Terence Crawford, who stopped him in six rounds.
His final fight was against Billy Dib, which he won by fourth-round stoppage.
He returned three years later to settle an old rivalry against fellow Brit, Kell Brook. It was a fight fans had wanted for years, and it seemed to come too late, as both men looked a shadow of their prime selves, though Brook, who was coming off of a two-year layoff, proved to be the better man, stopping Khan in six.