By Erik Schmidt: On April 25th, we may be seeing the next middleweight champion world champion with undefeated middleweight contender Gennady Golovkin (15-0, 12 KOs) going up against unbeaten Tarvis Simms (24-0-1, 11 KOs) in a 10-round bout at the König Palast, Krefeld, in Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany. Golovkin, 26, the 2004 Olympic Silver Medalist from Kazakhstan, has quickly moved up the pro ranks since turning professional in 2006.
Ranked at number #3 in the World Boxing Association (WBA) and #5 in the World Boxing Council (WBC), Golovkin is perhaps the best prospect in the middleweight division bar none. No offense to WBC/WBO middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik, who many boxing fans feel is the best fighter in the division, Golovkin may be even better already.
With wins over Andre Dirrell, Andy Lee, Lucian Bute, and Matvey Korobov in the amateur ranks, Golovkin came into the pros with impeccable credentials already. Not a particularly big fighter at 5’10”, Golovkin makes up for his lack of size by having excellent power, good hand speed and explosive combinations.
Explosive is the key word here, because that’s generally what Golovkin does in his fights. He fights slowly for a period of time, lulling his opponents into a false sense of security and then suddenly exploding on them with a powerful flurry of shots and taking them out.
This is exactly what Golovkin did in his last fight, a 1st round TKO over Javier Alberto Mamani in January 2009. Golovkin fought slowly for a brief period of time, throwing shots with only a fraction of power behind them, and then all of a sudden Golovkin loaded up with one of his right hands and hurt Mamani badly.
Golovkin attacked him, hurting him with left hooks to the head. Mamani backed to the ropes and was quickly mowed down by a series of hooks to the head by Golovkin. It was a stunning fight to watch, because of the sudden change in Golovkin’s fighting pace. At one point, Golovkin seemed harmless and average, and then the next second Golovkin looked like a completely different fighter throwing huge hooks with speed and power.
On April 25th, Golovkin will be facing the unbeaten Tarvis Simms, 37, the twin brother of once beaten light middleweight Travis Simms. Tarvis’ career has been managed carefully, spreading out his 23 wins over a 12 year period. Arguably Simms’ best win of his career is an 8-round split decision five years ago over Mexican knockout artist Carlos Bojorquez in 2004.
Unfortunately, for Simms, he was unable to follow the victory up with anything, fighting a 10-round draw in his next fight against Robert Frazier in April 2005. Simms failed to step up his competition until now, which at 37, may be too little too late for him to make it to the next level.
He’ll have his hands full against Golovkin that much is clear. I expect Simms to be competitive for a few rounds, but then quickly get taken out once Golovkin turns on his offensive machine.
Comments are closed.