Erislandy Lara moving to 160, targeting Golovkin

By Boxing News - 11/14/2015 - Comments

lara665By Chris Williams: With 32-year-old WBA World junior middleweight champion Erislandy Lara (21-2-2, 12 KOs) having exhausted all the possibilities of big money fights in the 154lb division after his controversial 12 round split decision loss to Saul “Canelo” Alvarez last year in July 2014, Lara is reportedly going to be moving up to the middleweight division [160] after his title defense this month against 39-year-old #8 WBA Jan Zaveck (35-3, 19 KOs) on Wednesday, November 25th on Premier Boxing Champions on ESPN at the Hialeah Park Race Track, in Hialeah, Florida.

Lara wants to target IBF/IBO/WBA middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin, as well as the other top fighters in the 160lb division like Peter Quillin, Miguel Cotto, Canelo, Andy Lee, Daniel Jacobs and Billy Joe Saunders.

“We are analyzing the possibilities of going to middleweight. We will be watching every fight of Jacobs-Quillin, Lee-Saunders, Cotto-Canelo and Golovkin,” said Lara’s adviser Luis De Cubas Jr. to ESPN Deportes. “The biggest fights are at 160. At 154, we won them all. Golovkin is one of the best fighters in the world, but he has never faced anyone of the quality and style of Lara.”

Lara has expressed interest in facing the KO artist Golovkin in the past, but with Lara fighting in a different division as the Kazakhstan star, he’s been unable to force the issue. By Lara fighting at 154, it makes it easy for Golovkin and his promoters at K2 Promotions to dismiss the fight due to the crafty Lara being in another division.

Lara would be a bad match-up for Golovkin because of his southpaw stance, fast hand speed, mobility and Floyd Mayweather Jr-like fighting style. I suspect Golovkin and his promoters at K2 wouldn’t agree to a fight against Lara unless he were a mandatory challenger to one of Golovkin’s title belts.

It’s makes all the sense in the world for Lara to move up in weight to 160lb, because there are no interesting fights at 154 for Lara. If he stays at junior middleweight, he’ll likely never get another big money fight again. Floyd Mayweather Jr. has retired, Canelo has moved up in weight to middleweight, and there aren’t any other big names in the 154lb division for Lara to fight.

Eventually there will be guys like Kell Brook moving up to 154 to campaign as a junior middleweight, but he’s likely to target WBO junior middleweight champion Liam Smith rather than face Lara for his WBA title. If Lara moves up to 160, then he’ll have the opportunity to go after the more lucrative fights against Canelo, Golovkin, Cotto, Lee, Saunders, Quillin and Jacobs.

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That obviously doesn’t mean that all of those guys will agree to fight Lara, but if he picks up a No.1 ranking with one of the top sanctioning bodies at middleweight, then he can force a fight against one of those names, unless they opt to vacate the belts in order to avoid him. While it’s possible guys like Canelo and Cotto will avoid Lara permanently at this point, Golovkin isn’t the type to avoid a fight or give up one of his world titles to steer around a tough opponent.

That might be Lara’s best bet if he wants a big money fight. If Lara beats Zaveck this month with ease, then he can vacate his WBA 154lb title and move up to 160 and look to get ranked by the IBF, WBA and WBC so that he can get a fight against Golovkin. By the time Lara does eventually face Golovkin in the future, Golovkin will likely be even more popular than he is now, and that will result in Lara getting a nice payday against him.

“I think at this point no one beats him at 154 pounds,” said De Cubas Jr. about Lara. “Lara is the king of this division [154].”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3A-Ultujhg

There’s really no point in Lara being the king of the junior middleweight division if there are no interesting fights for him. He can fight guys like Demetrius Andrade, the Charlo bothers and Vanes Martirosyan, but those aren’t big money fights for Lara. He’s better off vacating his WBA 154lb title and then moving up to 160 to go after the big names like Golovkin.

Lara, 5’10”, has the size to fight at middleweight, as he rehydrates to the low 170s like Golovkin and Canelo both do. Lara probably should have made the move to middleweight a long time ago, because there really hasn’t been anyone willing to fight him since his controversial loss to Canelo last year.

Since that fight, Lara has beaten Ishe Smith and Delvin Rodriguez. Fighting Zaveck has to be seen as a disappointment for Lara, because it is a million miles away from the big money fights he could be getting at 160 if he were facing the likes of Golovkin, Lee, Saunders, Quillin, Jacobs, Cotto and Canelo. That’s where the money is for Lara.

By fighting at middleweight, Lara will also be in the neighborhood of the super middleweight division, and this will put him in position to potentially get fights against guys like James DeGale, Badou Jack, George Groves, Arthur Abraham, Callum Smith and Gilberto Ramirez.

Lara is just too talented for the top fighters in the middleweight division, and I think he’ll beat Golovkin, Lee, Quillin, Jacobs, Cotto, Canelo and Saunders. I think Lara will never get a decision over Canelo though no matter how many times he beats him, but I do think he’ll keep beating him no matter how many times they face each other. I just think that Canelo is so popular right now that it would take a knockout by Lara in order for him to beat him. I can’t see the judges ever giving Lara a decision win over a guy like Canelo. But as long as the boxing public sees the fight and recognizes Lara as the winner, as many of them did last year when he fought Canelo, then that’s good enough.

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Besides the Lara-Zaveck fight, the November 25th fight card will have the following fights:

Yudel Jhonson vs. Daquan Arnett

John Wesley Nofire vs. Yasmany Consuegra

Emmanuel Rodriguez vs. Eliecer Aquino



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