Loeffler wants Froch for Golovkin after Brook

By Boxing News - 08/17/2016 - Comments

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By Scott Gilfoid: If former super middleweight champion Carl Froch is tired of yapping on the sidelines about boxing, he’s got a big money match against unbeaten IBF/IBO/WBA/WBC middleweight champion Gennady “GGG” Golovkin (35-0, 32 KOs) waiting for him. Golovkin’s promoter Tom Loeffler says he’s open to making a fight between Golovkin and the 39-year-old Froch after the Kell Brook (36-0, 25 KOs) fight next month on September 10.

Loeffler says that he’d be willing to match Golovkin against either Froch or Chris Eubank Jr. if everything goes right with the Brook fight next month at the O2 Arena in London, England.

“We’d be open to the Carl Froch fight too,” said Loeffler to IFL TV. “When you see Carl, tell him if everything goes the right way with Brook, we’d be open for that fight,” said Loeffler.

Froch (33-2, 24 KOs) has been mouthing off lately about Golovkin. Froch reportedly thinks Golovkin should move up in weight to fight guys his own size. Well, I think Golovkin, 5’10 ½”, would be willing to move up to 168 to fight the 6’1” Froch if he could come out of retirement to take the fight with GGG.

Froch hasn’t fought since stopping George Groves in the 8th round in their needless rematch in May 2014. That was Froch’s second consecutive fight against Groves at the time. Just why he’d want to fight an inexperienced guy like Groves for a second time is anyone’s guess. I know what it seems like to me. It seems like a nice record-padding fight opportunity for Froch.

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When Golovkin was asked on Tuesday if he’d be interested in fighting Froch, he scrunched up his face as if he had just eaten something bitter, and said, “No, he’s finished. He’s a clown.”

Golovkin didn’t see Froch as being someone that would seriously come back to fight him, so he didn’t consider it even worthy of being a discussion point. You could perfectly well understand where Golovkin is coming from, because Froch wasn’t interested in fighting him when he was still active in the sport. If Froch wasn’t willing to fight Golovkin for millions in 2014, then I sure as heck don’t see him taking that fight two years later.

I don’t know why Froch wouldn’t take the fight. If it were me and I had the chance to make that kind of cash in the ring, they would pull me out of it kicking and screaming. I wouldn’t ever leave the ring. Froch could probably make anywhere from $4 million to $6 million for a fight against Golovkin. It might even be more. Who knows? I think Froch would bring in more fans than Kell Brook, because he was a bigger star during his career.

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The only thing is I don’t think Froch fancies the idea of getting into the ring with Golovkin. The chances of everything coming apart at the seams for Froch would be too high. It would be like asking Froch to touch the third rail in the subway for the heck of it. I don’t think Froch wants any part of sharing the ring with Golovkin, ever. It’s not that Froch wouldn’t have his moments in the fight. It’s just that it would likely end badly for him with Golovkin knocking him clean out. I think Froch is one of those guys who is more concerned with his legacy than in making some good clean cash fighting a destroyer like Golovkin.

The thing is by not testing himself by fighting the best, Froch’s legacy is kind of not that impressive in my view. I mean, Froch’s last two fights were against Groves, who isn’t seen as a huge talent in the 168lb division. Badou Jack beat Groves, and James DeGale was arguably robbed in his fight against him in 2011. Froch’s best wins of his career were against Groves, Lucian Bute, Arthur Abraham, a shot Mikkel Kessler, an old Glen Johnson, Jermain Taylor after he’s been beaten twice by Kelly Pavlik, and Andre Dirrell. I thought Dirrell should have easily won his fight against Froch in 2009.

I thought Froch should have been disqualified for the fouling he did in that fight, because he was really working the talented Dirrell over with the rough stuff. With Golovkin’s name on Froch’s resume, I see it as being an incomplete one, filled with a bunch of middle of the road fighters. When Kessler was in his prime, he beat Froch. Dirrell should have beat Froch, and Jermain Taylor was on the verge of beating Froch when he was knocked out in the 12th.