Berto not sure where Golovkin gets his power

By Boxing News - 04/29/2016 - Comments

Image: Berto not sure where Golovkin gets his powerBy Allan Fox: Former WBC welterweight champion Andre Berto is one of the many admirers of IBF/IBO/WBA middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin’s punching power. Berto doesn’t quite understand where Golovkin gets his punching power though, because he notes that Kazakhstan fighter doesn’t have much muscle on his wiry frame, and yet he punches so hard.

Golovkin punches hard enough to hurt bigger fighters that spar with him. He says he’s not punching them to the head either. It’s body shots and he’s still able to generate a lot of power.

Berto thinks there’s something wrong with Golovkin with the way he can punch with so much power. Berto figures that Golovkin simply has dense bones, and that enables him to hit harder than the average fighter.

“Golovkin, something’s wrong with him, Man,” Berto said to the media. “He’s got some problems. I’ve talked to a lot of guys that have been with him to spar and I talked to [Gabriel] Rosado, and he’s like, ‘Dude, it’s like he’s got something in his gloves.’ Even sparring partners; we’re blocking and we got bruises on our arms the next day. He spars bigger guys and still hurting them. I guess he got dense bones or something. He don’t have muscles for real. I don’t know,” said Berto.

Golovkin’s power might be something that will continue to work against him in the future, because with 22 straight knockouts, he’s literally scaring off hordes of fighters and their promoters. No one wants to be the next knockout victim of Golovkin.

If Saul “Canelo” Alvarez is the next one to avoid Golovkin, then that would be a pretty big statement about Golovkin. According to Canelo’s promoter Oscar De La Hoya, Canelo is the one that has replaced Floyd Mayweather Jr. as boxing’s biggest star. But if Canelo isn’t willing to face the best, then what does that say about Canelo and the sport.

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It would suggest that the sport isn’t about the best, but more about who the more popular fighter is. If Canelo chooses to avoid Golovkin, then it might soon put the Kazakhstan fighter in a position where he’ll need to make a decision whether to stay at middleweight and defend against the less than popular contenders in the weight class, or to move up to 168 and even 175 to go after the bigger names.

The fighters in the heavier weight classes will be more inclined to fight Golovkin because they’ll have a huge size advantage over him. Golovkin is already small for the middleweight division. Golovkin may need to move up in weight if he wants to get the big money fights. Unfortunately, there aren’t any big stars in the super middleweight division now that Carl Froch has retired.

Golovkin would need to go all the way to light heavyweight to fight the likes of Andre Ward or Adonis Stevenson. Sergey Kovalev already said he won’t fight Golovkin because he’s a friend of his. That leaves only Stevenson and Ward. Stevenson fights on Showtime, so a fight against him isn’t an option either. There’s only Ward. If Ward loses to Kovalev this November, then that will take a lot of the interest in a potential Golovkin vs. Ward fight.