By Dan Ambrose: Paulie Malignaggi says he doesn’t get what’s so special about the Saul “Canelo” Alvarez vs. Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. fight, and he feels that the Gennady “GGG” Golovkin vs. Daniel Jacobs match-up is a much better fight in terms of entertainment. I think for a lot of boxing fans, they agree with Malignaggi.
Canelo-Chavez Jr. pales in comparison to the Golovkin-Jacobs fight, which matches two of the best fighters in the middleweight division today against each other. Golovkin and Jacobs are two knockout artists with 62 knockouts between them.
In the case of the Canelo-Chavez Jr. fight, it’s a fight matching an arguably past his prime Chavez Jr. fighting a newer version of himself in Canelo, who does a lot of the same things that Chavez Jr. used to do with the way that Canelo dehydrates huge amounts of weight to fight in a division that is far below his weight. Like how Chavez Jr. used to do, Canelo then puts a ton of weight back on after he rehydrates and uses his size advantage to beat lighter fighters than himself. This is what Chavez Jr. used to do when he fought at middleweight. You can argue that Canelo is just the newer version of Chavez Jr.
Canelo and Chavez Jr. will be fighting on May 6 on HBO pay-per-view. As of now, the venue for the fight could be at the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Golovkin and Jacobs will be fighting on March 18 on HBO PPV at Madison Square Garden in New York.
Malignaggi said this to Fighthype.com about Canelo vs. Chavez Jr. and Golovkin vs. Daniel Jacobs fights:
“It’s a very good fight for boxing,” said Malignaggi about the Canelo-Chavez Jr. fight. “It’s a good fight for money. I don’t know what it does for the sport of boxing. I think it’ll get a lot of fans to watch it. It’s a big Hispanic fight. It sets him up for his own criticism, if he can live with it. At times, I say I don’t know if he’s a real middleweight, but then he does something like this and it’s hard to defend. Hopefully, we’ll see that fight [Canelo vs. Golovkin] eventually. There might be more money for everyone in the Chavez fight than there is for the Golovkin fight. I don’t know the numbers, but I do know there’s a lot of money in the Chavez fight. Business-wise, there’s a possibility the fight might generate more money as crazy as it sounds. Triple G-Jacobs is a great fight. Hopefully, people appreciate it and turn out for it, because it’s a great fight, a much better fight for me than Canelo-Chavez. I’m not Mexican, so maybe there’s something I don’t know about the way the fight is so big between Canelo and Chavez. For me, a boxing fans looking at it from the outside and not having any Hispanic roots, for me, Golovkin-Jacobs kills the other one,” said Malignaggi.
I don’t know that Canelo-Chavez Jr. is a good fight for boxing. I know it’s going to make those involved in the fight a lot of money. Canelo,, Golden Boy and Chavez Jr. will make a lot of money, but unless there’s an upset, which is doubtful, I don’t think it’s going to be a big deal for boxing.
It’s just another Canelo vs. James Kirkland fight. In other words, Canelo will be fighting another guy from the past, who rarely fights, and who is no longer relevant in this day and age in the sport. Chavez Jr. was very relevant in the past up until 2012. His loss to Sergio Martinez killed his career for all intents and purposes. Chavez Jr. has kept fighting, but his career has never been the same, and he’s not shown the ability that he once had since that loss. Even in the Sergio Martinez fight, Chavez Jr. didn’t perform well, and he had a terrible training camp in electing to train in his living room at times. Chavez Jr’s last impressive fight in which he looked to be in good shape was in 2012 against Andy Lee. That was a good fight for Chavez Jr.
On paper, Golovkin vs. Jacobs is a far better fighter than the Canelo vs. Chavez Jr. fight. Everything is setup to work against the Canelo-Chavez Jr. fight ending with an upset. You’ve the catch-weight at 164 ½ pounds, a weight that Chavez Jr. has not been at since 2012. It’s going to likely hurt Chavez Jr. trying to make weight for the fight, and even if he does make the weight, he’s very likely toing to be weaker for it.
Besides the catch-weight, Chavez Jr. has not been fighting regularly in the last five years. He’s fought but rarely and he’s not looked good since his fight against Lee in 2012. It’s just with Golden Boy picking out Kirkland for Canelo to fight in 2015. Kirkland hadn’t looked good in years and was no longer fighting on a regular basis. He was a guy that stopped being relevant years before. The fact that Golden Boy picked Kirkland out rather than one of the top 154lb fighters like Jermall Charlo suggested at the time that they didn’t have confidence that Canelo could beat Charlo. So instead of getting him, they signed Kirkland, a fighter from the past to fight Canelo.
Golovkin and Jacob is a fight between two of the best fighters at 160. This is a match that some boxing fans see as a 50-50 affair. I’m not one of them. I think Golovkin wins the fight by a knockout, but Jacobs has the power to pull off an upset if he can land one of his big power shots. You can’t rule out Jacobs getting lucky and landing one of his big shots like he did against Peter Quillin in 2015 when he knocked him out in the 1st round. But in comparison to the Canelo-Chavez Jr. fight, the Golovkin-Jacobs fight is the much better one in my view. It just doesn’t have the entire U.S going crazy for it the way Mexico is going crazy for the Canelo vs. Chavez Jr. fight.