Back in 2019, DAZN launched a The Making Of docuseries brand as part of their DAZN Originals lineup, with the first three (all with three 30-minute installments) focusing on soccer figures (Cristiano Ronaldo, José Mourinho, and Neymar Jr.). They’ve done several of these since, and Friday saw them announce another one, on Saúl ‘Canelo’ Álvarez ahead of his Sept. 17 trilogy fight with Gennadiy ‘GGG’ Golovkin. These episodes are available now on DAZN. Here’s a trailer for the new series:
Canelo has previously been a docuseries subject for DAZN, with their first original episodic series being the three-part The Journey: Canelo/Rocky in 2018 around Canelo’s fight with Rocky Johnson. But the focus in The Making Of is a little different, covering his full career to date rather than just his preparations for this particular fight. Here’s more on what to expect from it from a release:
Canelo’s ‘The Making Of’ episodes will see him open up about three of the biggest nights of his career: his 2014 bout and first ever loss against Floyd Mayweather, his 2018 rematch with GGG, and his 2019 light heavyweight championship matchup against Sergey Kovalev.
Alongside exclusive and revealing interviews with Canelo, ‘The Making Of’ also features testimony from some of boxing’s finest to further get to the heart of who Canelo is and what made him into the person he is today. Cameos include Canelo’s long-time trainer Eddy Reynoso, former opponent Daniel Jacobs, DAZN on-air talent Chris Mannix and Claudia Trejos, as well as Matchroom supremo and Canelo’s promoter Eddie Hearn.
‘The Making Of’ Saúl ‘Canelo’ Álvarez was commissioned by DAZN and is a co-production between Archers Mark and DAZN Studios. Alongside the DAZN Originals team including Grant Best (Executive Producer & EVP Global Commissioning Original Content), Hugh Sleight (Executive Producer), Christine Wilt (Executive Producer) and Kevin Joseph (VP of Original Programming), the series is directed by Dan Riley and produced by Moby Longinotto.
And here are some provided quotes from the series:
Canelo on the Mayweather fight:
“Simply, it was down to experience. If I compare that Canelo with Canelo today, they are completely different. It’d be a completely different fight now. I’ve always said that perhaps if I’d won that night, everything would have come my way. Fame, money and perhaps it wouldn’t have worked out well then. I could’ve perhaps gone crazy. It wasn’t my moment. That’s how I take it, it wasn’t my moment. It took me a few days for me to accept it.”
Canelo on the GGG rematch:
“I’m not a person who cries a lot but there are times you can’t take it all in. The truth is that those feelings are unique. Having my family there, my wife, my children, my mom, my dad, my siblings, my friends, all my team. For me, it’s very important; it means a lot. Why? Because, in the end, family is the most important thing for us.”
Canelo on Kovalev:
“Being a world champion in another division, imagine! Such a small boxer like me -a Mexican, winning a world championship as light heavyweight when nobody thought I’d win a world championship in the 154 division because I was very small. Imagine what that means to me.”
The Canelo-DAZN relationship has had its ups and downs over the years. The streaming service signed him to a 11-fight, $365 million deal in 2018, but the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic shutdown particularly impacted that. That led to a canceled fight against Billy Joe Saunders, a pay dispute around a planned fight with Callum Smith, a lawsuit from Canelo against DAZN and Golden Boy Promotions in Sept. 2020, and a Nov. 2020 agreement to cut ties and cancel the rest of Canelo’s existing deal.
However, Canelo came back on board with DAZN for two fights this February, and their shift to embracing a pay-per-view model for particularly big fights certainly helped with that; his May fight against Dmitry Bivol (Bivol won by unanimous decision) was DAZN’s first-ever PPV, and this Sept. 17 fight will also be on DAZN PPV. At any rate, he’s certainly a giant boxing star, and this trilogy fight against GGG is hotly anticipated by many, so it makes sense for DAZN to add some original content promoting it.
[DAZN on YouTube]
