Golovkin-Jacobs negotiations: WBA gives Loeffler 15-day extension

By Boxing News - 10/21/2016 - Comments

1-o2arena-golovkin-brook-52

By Dan Ambrose: Tom Loeffler of K2 Promotions reportedly was given a 15-day extension by the World Boxing Association to continue negotiating the Gennady “GGG” Golovkin vs. Daniel Jacobs fight. The deadline for the negotiations to end is on Saturday, October 22nd.

Golovkin has already given up the December 10 fight date on HBO. The negotiations that Loeffler is doing now are to try and get the fight put together for early 2017 in February or March. It’s hard to imagine the fight not taking place by that point if the negotiations are done, because it’s in both of their interest to keep fighting often as possible.

For Jacobs, it’s unclear if his manager Al Haymon can get him fight dates on television or not. Jacobs has only fought once in 2016, and he’s done for the year

“Just trying to finalize the deal with the Jacobs side,” Loeffler said to Ringtv.com. “No sense in forcing a purse bid when it looks like we can work out a deal that makes more sense for the fighters than the purse bid split.”

The negotiations have done on for ages. Jacobs’ management asked the WBA for an increase of their purse from 75/25 to 60/40, which the WBA turned them down and kept it at 75/25. It’s thought that Loeffler is bumping up the money for Jacobs’ side in the 70/30 range or slightly higher, but they’re obviously not going to increase it to 60/40. There’s not a ton of money for this fight due it not being televised on HBO pay-per-view.

All total, the total revenue at stake is estimated to be between $5 million and $6 million according to one of Dan Rafael’s sources. That total is BEFORE the expenses. It’s not enough money at stake for the fight negotiations to be dragged out like this. When you realize that Jacobs and Golovkin are both missing a payday in 2016 by them not fighting in December, it means that the money they’re eventually getting in the fight will be less than what they could have made had they simply fought each other in December, and then moved on and fought someone else in early 2017. By missing a payday both fighters are negatively impacted.

It’s unclear how much of a purse split Jacobs’ team will accept before they’ll agree. If it looks like Loeffler will need to give them close or the entire 60/40 split that they’re asking for in the negotiations, then maybe he should give it to them. At least if Loeffler had made that move, then Golovkin wouldn’t have missed the December 10 fight date. He wouldn’t’ be losing a payday out of the fight. Believe me; Golovkin would have been better off giving Jacobs the 60/40 split in terms of the money, because he’s losing a payday by not fighting in December. It’s unclear what Jacobs’ thoughts are in fighting just once in 2016. He’s got to realize that by fighting only once in 2016, he’s not going to come out ahead in this. He might get a little more money when the negotiations are completed, but if he’s missing a payday by not fighting in December or November, then it’s not a smart thing for him.

This is not a huge fight between Jacobs and Golovkin, so it’s hard to understand why Jacobs’ team didn’t get the negotiations over with quickly so that they could get the money the fight is worth, and then move on to fight against someone else .

The two teams have been negotiating since last September, and it should have gone to a purse bid already. If the WBA had let the fight go to a purse bid, then they would have been able to fight in December 10 if Golovkin or Jacobs didn’t pull out of the fight, which they could have done. In Golovkin’s case, he would have still been able to fight in December against someone else if he chose not to fight Jacobs if his team lost the purse bid.

By not fighting a third time in December, it’s a lose-lose situation for Golovkin, because he doesn’t get a chance to fight three times in 2016, and he needs to be seen as much as possible by boxing fans in the U.S., because he’s trying to become a star. At 34, Golovkin doesn’t have age on his side to be missing fights due to him taking a non-pay-per-view. It wasn’t worth it for him to miss a fight date for a fight against Jacobs.

It would be understandable if this was a fight against Saul Canelo Alvarez and there was a ton of money that Golovkin would make off of it because it would be on HBO PPV. But a fight against Jacobs isn’t a PPV worthy fight, and the revenue that Golovkin will make for this fight isn’t enough for him to justify missing a payday because of it.

This goes back to Golovkin wanting to win all the middleweight titles. If he doesn’t care about the titles, then he could just give up the WBA belt and focus on getting the best fights possible rather than in having to haggle for months in the negotiation process with Jacobs’ manager over a small money fight.

If it looks like the fight negotiations aren’t going to produce a fight after the 15 day extension goes by, then Loeffler needs to just let it to go a purse bid and take his chances. I think it would be better to get it over with rather than having the negotiations go on without end. What Golovkin’s team doesn’t need is for the negotiations to continue into 2017 without the fight having been put together.

If Golovkin’s team can’t win the purse bid, then they will need to decide on whether it’s best to just give up the belt rather than extending the negotiations over and over again without being able to put the fight together.

Once Golovkin gets the Jacobs fight out of the way, he can look to defend against some of his mandatory challengers in 2017. If the fight negotiations don’t drop dead date, then this thing could drag on.