Saul Alvarez of Mexico reacts to his knockout of Carlos Baldomir of Argentina during the sixth round in the WBC Super Welterweight Silver Title fight at Staples Center on September 18, 2010 in Los Angeles, California.
(September 17, 2010 – Photo by Harry How/Getty Images North America)

(PhatzRadio / USA Today) — Mexico’s Saul “Canelo” Alvarez remained undefeated with a bruising fifth-round technical knockout of Kermit Cintron and successfully defended his WBC light middleweight title Saturday night in Mexico City.

Alvarez (39-0-1, 29 KOs), remains the youngest reigning champion in the world at age 21.

Alvarez spent the first three rounds feeling out Cintron (33-5-1, 28 KOs), a former welterweight champion, before punishing the Puerto Rican with body shots and straight right hands in the fourth round. He knocked Cintron down once and had him in trouble at the end of the round, but Cintron was saved by the bell.

In the fifth round, Cintron came out and caught Alvarez with some combinations, but Alvarez eventually overpowered him with several powerful straight right hands, and referee Hector Afu stepped in and stopped it at 2:53 of the fifth round.

Alvarez landed 79 total punches to Cintron’s 41, and had a huge edge in power shots, 62-19.

Alvarez said he listened to his corner’s instructions. “Don’t despair, as we said from the beginning,” he said. “I think we did a very good job and that was the end result.

“He’s a very strong fighter, we prepared intelligently and followed the instructions from the corner and that’s how we ended up winning the fight.”

After the fight, Alvarez called out undefeated Floyd Mayweather, the world’s top pound-for-pound fighter. “Next year we want the best, we want Mayweather in May,” he said. “Apart from the money, we want to fight the best in the world and he’s the best pound for pound, so we want to fight him.”

In the opening fight on the split site card, Cincinnati’s 22-year-old Adrien Broner won the vacant WBO junior lightweight title in dominating fashion in his hometown with a devastating third-round knockout of Vicente Martin Rodriguez of Argentina.

Broner (22-0, 18 KOs) hurt the wild-swinging Rodriguez with a right uppercut, then punished him with a hard body shot before dropping him with a right hook. Rodriguez was unable to beat the 10-count from referee Frank Garza.

“This is my dream,” Broner told HBO’s Max Kellerman after the fight. “I told my dad I’d be world champion on November 26th.”

Broner becomes the sixth world champion from Cincinnati, following in the footsteps of such greats as Ezzard Charles and Aaron Pryor. He is also the second-youngest reigning titleholder in the world behind Alvarez.

Asked what was next, Broner said, “We’re going to go to the drawing board with (manager) Al Haymon and (promoter) Golden Boy and see what’s on the table.”

Also on the Cincinnati card, former 2008 Olympians Gary Russell Jr. and Deontay Wilder both won by first-round knockouts.

Russell (19-0, 11 KOs) KO’d Heriberto Ruiz (47-11-2) with two left hooks, first to the body then to the head. Wilder knocked out David Long (11-2-2) in the first round and has won all 20 of his professional fights by knockout.