After a lot of backlash for commenting that he wouldn’t be interested in fighting Canelo Alvarez in May, IBF super middleweight titleholder Caleb Plant takes some time to clarify what he meant when he said that and where he’s looking to go from here. Check out some excerpts below...

Plant on what he makes of the response he’s received for not looking towards a possible May fight with Canelo:

“A lot of say so on both sides of the coin. A lot of people understand what I was saying and what I meant, and then a lot of people understanding what I’m saying because they understand boxing and how it works, and then there’s some people that’s just a fan of Canelo — they wanna see him fight and win no matter whose expense it’s at or how it happens or how long they get to train or how long they get to rest. No matter what I say I’ll never be able to convince those people otherwise so...”

On likening a May fight against Canelo to the one Kovalev had with him, where Kovalev later admitted it was a cash grab he took knowing he didn’t have adequate time to rest:

“Yes. Yes, absolutely. And Kovalev admitted to that and I know that people say ‘Well Kovalev had a tough fight with Anthony Yarde and you didn’t have a tough fight’ — but I’m not talking about resting from the fight. I don’t need to rest from the fight, and most of the time you don’t need to rest from the fight. It’s the training camp that you rest from, all the miles, all the sparring rounds, all the sprints and making weight.

“‘Oh, well Andy Ruiz, he did it!’ But that wound up being a fluke anyways and on top of that he don’t have to make weight. So he even said he doesn’t do a disciplined camp anyways. I do a disciplined camp, so for me to do that as long as I have and then take these two weeks of February off and then train March and April just to fight May 2nd — anyone who knows boxing knows that’s not how it works.

“Everyone used to fight five or six times (a year), yeah, but everybody stopped doing that too, and that’s for a reason. And at the same time, everybody was doing it so it’s an even playing field. If it’s just me doing it, then that’s not an even playing field. So, I don’t know.”

On how much rest he normally needs between fights:

“I’ll rest for like a month-and-a-half maybe, tops. But I’ll be active in the meantime...You have to rest, you have adrenal glands — when you do high activity it drains those. Those have to refill. I’m not trying to get too scientific and stuff, I’m more of an old school boxing, you know, the way I go my boxing is more old school anyways but those are scientific facts.

“I’m not ducking nobody, I never even said I don’t want to fight Canelo. I do want to fight Canelo, but I’m not fighting him in May, that’s all I’m saying. Not in May.

“They say ‘Well Andy Ruiz did that’ but Andy Ruiz wasn’t a world champion, so he was jumping on the opportunity to become one. I don’t have to jump on an opportunity to become a world champion because I’m already one and I’ve already defended my belt twice. I’ve solidified myself as a world-class caliber boxer. So I don’t just have to jump on a penny.

“Fans get so mad and hate when they think a fighter is just all about the money and now you have a fighter right here who’s saying I’m not just in it for the money, otherwise I would jump on this fight. I’m in it for legacy, I’m in it to become a superstar, I’m in this for the long haul. I’m a real world champion. Then you do that and they’re still mad...

“I’m all for fighting three times a year, I’m all for that, but anyone who knows boxing knows that’s completely unreasonable. They trying to get me — I’ve been in this for a long time, I know how boxing works.”

On Oscar De La Hoya saying that now he’ll never get another chance to fight Canelo:

“...Canelo said that he’s fighting Billy Joe and then he’s fighting in Japan next. That’s a lot different from what Oscar’s saying. So maybe Oscar needs to get on the same page with his fighter because it sounds like they on two separate pages and if he’s fighting in Japan after this, who you think he’s fighting? You think he’s fighting me?! Okay, so it sounds like he needs to get on the same page with his fighter.”

On where he wants to go next in his career:

“Well me and my team over the weekend have sent out a legitimate offer to Callum Smith to try and make a unification fight, and we also sent out a legitimate offer — if that falls through — to GGG to try to make, because he’s moving up to 168. So I want big fights, I want fights that the fans will want, I want unification fights, but I’m just not gonna be taken advantage of with silly stuff like fighting so close back to back.”

On if he’s gotten any response from Smith or Golovkin:

“I have not but, fingers crossed...I’m trying to make the best fights I can, possible.”