By Miguel Rivera

Jose 'Chepo' Reynoso, manager for Mexican superstar Saul "Canelo" Alvarez (49-1-2, 34 KOs), believes 2018 will be the best year to date for his fighter's career.

In 2017, Canelo started off the action with a dominating one-sided unanimous decision win over longtime Mexican rival Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.

And then in the fall, Canelo took part in his highly anticipated showdown with IBF, WBC, WBA, IBO middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin (37-0-1, 33 KOs), also at the T-Mobile.

The fight with Golovkin went to a controversial twelve round split draw.

At the moment, the two sides are in deep negotiations for a rematch - targeted for the Cinco De Mayo date of May 5th, likely back in Las Vegas.

"At the moment there is nothing set down. We know that the discussions for the tie-breaker between GGG and Saul are still going on, there is nothing firm," said Chepo to ESPN Deportes.  "So we are on standby, we can not say much until we can talk to Golden Boy, so there is little to say for now."

"2017 was a good year, because there were two fights that the fans had asked for, the first one with (Julio César Chávez) Junior, [a fight where everyone had been waiting for 10 years to finally take place], and the result was good. The second fight was with GGG. In the end it was a good fight that perhaps did not satisfy either us or the people from the opposite corner. We think that we won and they think they did, so it is obvious that we are all interested in the tie-breaker.

"At middleweight, there are going to be a lot more interesting things, because it's a weight where Saul will not have as many problems to make it and that's where I think we'll see the best of Canelo.... we are talking about a mature Saul - physical, with his boxing and mentally He has been taught great things, things that have pleased the entire team.

"They said that GGG was going to knock him out and they were going to retire him, but that did not happen. On the contrary, we believe that 2018 will be very good for Canelo, the best year so far. He also confirmed himself as the top ticket seller and that makes us have some great expectations."