Should Golovkin been disqualified for hitting Lemieux while he was down?

By Boxing News - 10/20/2015 - Comments

Boxing: Golovkin vs LemieuxBy Scott Gilfoid: If you’ve seen IBF/IBO/WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin’s recent fight against former IBF 160lb champion David Lemieux (34-3, 31 KOs) last Saturday night, you’ve have noticed that Golovkin nailed Lemieux with a right hand to the head in the 5th round after he had been knocked to the canvas from a left hand body shot.

Lemieux was clearly on the canvas, doubled over with a look of pain in his face when Golovkin threw a right hand coup de grace while he was down. The referee Steve Willis didn’t even lift a finger to take a point off or disqualify Golovkin from the fight. I’m just saying. Golovkin should have been booted for that move. I mean, it reminded me of how Arthur Abraham teed off on the talented Andre Dirrell in their fight in 2010 after Dirrell had slipped on the wet canvas.

Instead of holding back against the defenseless Dirrell, Abraham wound up with everything he had in connecting with a right hand to the head of Dirrell. The punch toppled Dirrell over onto his side in knocking him clean out. Dirrell was in the sitting position when he was nailed and unable to defend himself.

I think I speak for everyone when I say that Lemieux deserved the win over Golovkin after that cheap shot in the 5th. I don’t know how referee Steve Willis didn’t boot Golovkin out of the fight for that foul because there’s no way that he should have gotten away with doing that. You can make an argument that Lemieux was never the same after that foul. I mean, he certainly didn’t look any good to me after the knockdown, and it could be that the punch negatively affected him.

I can’t say I was impressed with Golovkin’s performance in this fight. He looked slow to me, both of hand and foot. And it was really surprising how Golovkin didn’t even try and finish Lemieux off after he hurt him with his body shot and fouled him in the 5th. I’ve heard some boxing fans say that Golovkin only left Lemieux survive because he wanted to toy with him the same way that a cat sometimes toys with a mouse after he catches it. I don’t buy that though. I saw the look of fear in Golovkin’s face at all times in the fight last Saturday, and I don’t think he wanted to change it by going after Lemieux to try and finish him off.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzUJirDOzMM

I think he was flat out afraid of getting nailed by one of Lemieux’s Hail Mary left hooks, which would have been a game changer. But nonetheless, I wasn’t impressed at all with Golovkin’s lack of urgency to try and finish off Lemieux. If Golovkin is supposed to be the next superstar in boxing, then why in the heck didn’t he look to put Lemieux out of his misery when he had a chance? I have my own theory why he didn’t. I think Golovkin was flat out afraid.

When you look back at Hall of Fame fighters like Marvin Hagler and Sugar Ray Robinson, those guys were never afraid to finish off their hurt opponents. They were always willing to leap to destroy their hurt opponents. They weren’t afraid to get nailed by shots in doing so. But in what I saw from Golovkin last Saturday, he looked scared to me, and not anything like Robinson or Hagler. Needless to say, I was totally unimpressed by Golovkin, both with his fouling cheap shot and with the scared-like way he fought the entire fight.

Golovkin fought like someone who was shaking in his boots instead of like a superstar. As such, Golovkin didn’t fight up to the high standards that we’ve seen from greats in the past. For that reason, I can’t give him a passing grade for his fight against Lemieux. He wasn’t good enough for their high standards.



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