Blame Cotto and WBC, not GGG

By Boxing News - 03/27/2015 - Comments

cotto88888By Robert “Counter Punch” Elmore: There seems to be a lot of criticism of Gennady Golovkin. A lot of it has to with his selection of fighters. Some, like myself, says he should move up. But I’m not saying he should move to fight Andre Ward (who by the way still has not picked an opponent or has been in the ring in almost 3 years).

My wanting Golovkin to move up comes from the fact that the other champions will have and have not been willing to grace the ring with him. That’s it. I don’t believe he’s scared of anybody. He has gone on record saying he’s willing to take less money to make a big fight happen. Recently, Golovkin has expressed going down to 154 to fight Floyd Mayweather Jr or Manny Pacquiao. We can count Pac out because he said 54 was too much weight for him (even though he only weighed 148 pounds on fight night against Antonio Margarito). But it makes sense since those two are the biggest names in the sport and it would come with hefty pay day. In this scenario, Golovkin’s team sees it as “going down to come up”. While people are taking time to dump on Golovkin, what I DON’T see are people tackling often are the enforcement of rules from the WBC and Miguel Cotto.

Since winning the WBC middleweight title from Sergio Martinez, Cotto has not defended it. Some fighters don’t have that “I’m going to vacate this title since I have no intentions of defending it and let give the opportunity to let someone else become champion” attitude. That comes from maturity in ones’ self. Cotto has been champ in four different divisions so why not let someone else become champ in one? Or at the very least give the opportunity for a unification bout to happen to bring more clarity to the division. Trip is the number one contender for the WBC belt so it would him vs the number two guy. Cotto is on his way out the door and he’s simply looking for cash out fights. In my humble opinion, Cotto doesn’t need a belt do cash out. His name can that alone. For example, when Floyd fought Shane Mosley, Floyd base purse was 22.5 million dollars while Shane’s was 7 million. Keep in mind Shane was champion after beat Antonio Margarito for his WBA belt. If Cotto vacated his belt and fought Trip Hammer, he would still get the lions share based off his name. Cotto knows this because he did it against Martinez in which he made 7 million dollars while Martinez made 1.5 million. But how is he able to hold this belt hostage? The WBC allows him to.

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The WBC can enforce any rules they want when they get ready. Want proof? Not too long ago they ordered for negotiations for WBC champ and Sergey Kovalev to get under way or else it will go to a purse bid. Now that sounds good on paper right? But will they move in to strip Stevenson should Stevenson’s team chose to do otherwise?

The alphabet soup usually doesn’t bother those who bring in big bucks for them. How long has Floyd Mayweather been sitting on those WBC and WBA straps at 54? And there has been no movement; no threatening letters for him to be stripped either.

Manny Pacquiao was allowed to defend his WBO strap for the longest but it came against guys who brought the most money in. They know they are going to clean up with sanctioning fees. Cotto should take some blame for not defending in strap at 60, but he’s simply taking advantage of the WBC’s generosity. But both parties can put an end to this holding the title hostage facade. But who will move first?



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