Monroe picks Canelo over Golovkin, says he’d be too fast for GGG

By Boxing News - 05/17/2015 - Comments

Image: Monroe picks Canelo over Golovkin, says he’d be too fast for GGGBy Dan Ambrose: Despite being dominated and bludgeoned into quitting on his feet in the 6th round, #2 WBA Willie Monroe Jr. (19-2, 6 KOs) says he thinks that former WBA/WBC junior middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (45-1-1, 32 KOs) would defeat IBO/WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin (33-0, 30 KOs) if they were to face each other right now.

Monroe picks Canelo to beat Golovkin because he feels that Canelo has the better hand speed than GGG, and he sees Canelo’s power as being very good as well. Monroe does think that Golovkin would have an edge over Miguel Cotto, at least in terms of punching power.

Monroe thinks a Cotto vs. Golovkin fight would be determined on who gets off their shots first. Monroe wasn’t ready to give Golovkin a lot of praise for his win over him because he feels he did well against him, and was able to land some shots on the inside.

Golovkin says he didn’t want to KO Monroe early in the fight because he wanted to entertain the fans. So he carried Monroe until the 6th and then knocked him out. However, I don’t think Monroe buys that. He believes that he was giving Golovkin problems based on his skills.

“He [Golovkin] probably beats Cotto, but I think he’d have problems with Canelo. Canelo has fast hands, and Canelo fights well on the inside,” Monroe said via Fighthype. “Canelo is very strong himself. So I think he’d have some problems with Canelo, but with Cotto, if he goes heads up, I give him [Golovkin] the power edge. I think Canelo would be a little too fast for him because my speed gave him some problems today, and Canelo has very fast hands. I would have to give the edge to Canelo if they were to fight. Triple G fights a lot like Cotto. It would be about who gets off first.”

I don’t agree with Monroe’s opinion about Canelo beating Golovkin. That opinion is about as good as Monroe’s opinion before his fight with Golovkin in which he felt he could beat him. We saw how well that worked out for Monroe. The problem with Canelo is he’s got horrible stamina, and gasses out way too quickly after he throws a handful of punches.

If Golovkin forces Canelo to fight at a fast pace, as he does with all his opponents, Canelo will back up against the ropes and try and rest. That’s not going to work against a fighter like Golovkin because he’ll pound Canelo into submission once he backs up against the ropes.

Canelo has the better punching power, better accuracy, and better overall talent in my view. We already saw Canelo get dominated by Floyd Mayweather Jr. and go life and death with Austin Trout and Erislandy Lara. I rate Golovkin as much better than those fighters, and that’s why I see him easily beating Canelo.

It’s too bad that Monroe can’t see his theory about the Golovkin-Canelo fight tested, but unfortunately Canelo doesn’t want to fight Golovkin. The fact that Canelo isn’t saying yes to that fight tells you a little bit about his confidence or lack thereof to get the job done against Golovkin.



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